So I was browsing around the Engineering News Record, and I found an article entitled “Construction Unemployment Soars As Housing Plunges”. The article is touting an increase in unemployment within the construction industry. In fact, it claims that the unemployment rate increased to 9.9% in September, up from last year’s rate of 5.8% (note that these are figures for the US).
Later in the article however, the true culprit is revealed to be the housing market:
Most of the damage came from the residential market, where employment fell 12.2% this year following a 6.7% drop in 2007, according to September data. Employment in the nonresidential building marker dropped 4.1% from a year ago.
So while the figures are largely due to the housing market, it’s quite possible that other industries are beginning to feel the slowdown even to the extent of employee layoffs.
I’m happy I’m in the field of municipal engineering, where a majority of the work is government-funded. Ideally, we’ll be one of the last to feel the crunch of the economy (though we certainly will at some point).
