Construction Metrics We’re Watching — November 2020: 2020 Employment Benchmarks

Editor’s note: As we continue to evaluate an ever-changing construction landscape, we’re keeping close tabs on a variety of industry stats and metrics, gathered from both industry reports and our own customer base. On a monthly basis, we’re sharing some of the most interesting and noteworthy highlights with you.

Throughout 2020 so far, we have seen a decline in employment compared to 2019 throughout the construction industry. This data set examines the onboarding of new employees monthly.

As we can see there are significantly less employees being hired when compared to 2019 (shown by the purple line). We see a 25% to 50% average decline in hiring in 2020 compared to 2019. Let’s break this down a little further:

Examining Verticals

Examining Regions

These graphs break down hires, terminations and net counts throughout the regions we operate in. There is a large customer base in the Pacific West region, however we service customers across the United States. As we can see, every region’s net count dipped negative in 2020, however the timings differ. The Pacific West experienced a large layoff event in February and March, while the Midwest experienced a large layoff in July and August.

Overall, we have seen layoff events in 2020, however the general trend is still up. While there may be less employees added than previous years, the trend for 2020 so far is still positive, and the construction industry continues to grow, but at a slower pace.

Those are the highlights from this month's activity tracking. But don't wait for us; you can follow the trends for yourself!

Visit the always-on Viewpoint Product Activity Index to get on-demand updates around construction trends.