Construction employment expanded in 232 metro areas, according to the Associated General Contractors of America (AGC), Arlington, Va.
The Seattle-Bellevue-Everett, Wash. MSA, added the largest number of construction jobs in the past year (12,600 jobs, 17%), followed by Denver-Aurora-Lakewood, Colo. (10,800 jobs, 12%), Anaheim-Santa Ana-Irvine, Calif. (7,800 jobs, 10%) and Los Angeles-Long Beach-Glendale, Calif. (7,800 jobs, 7%).
Much of the increase in the Seattle construction scene can be attributed to some giant downtown office projects. An Oct. 2014 article in the Puget Sound Business Journal said, “More than 100 projects worth at least $1 million each are underway. In total, $3.1 billion worth of buildings are currently under construction in central Seattle, according to the Downtown Seattle Association, following on $1.4 billion in buildings just completed in the last two years.
“Office square footage under construction has doubled in the past year, but two-thirds of what's being built in Seattle is residential — primarily apartments — to house an influx of workers at Amazon and other tech companies.”
No doubt many of these new contractors are working in the new multi-family residential projects now underway in the Seattle metropolitan area. According to U.S. Census data, building permits for multi-family starts YTD (year-to-date) through April in the Seattle metropolitan area were up 104% to 8,665 over the same period last year.
Footnote. Construction employment data from Associated General Contractors (AGC) and U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Estimates for electrical contractor employment and MSA sales potential from Electrical Wholesaling data.