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Contractor Job Openings Starting to Dry Up

Oct. 6, 2022

The number of job openings in the construction market is starting to slow down, part of an overall trend across many key U.S. business sectors. When you look at the August construction data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) on a three-month rolling average, openings decreased fractionally from 385,000 in July 2022 to 384,333 in August. While BLS doesn’t capture monthly electrical contractor job openings, they typically account for 13% of all construction employment, there are 49,963 (three-month average) job openings in the electrical construction business.

Another quick indicator to watch is the number of jobs that the nation’s largest electrical contractors post on LinkedIn. EM’s editors found 1,892 job openings posted by nine of the larger electrical contractors in EC&M magazine’s Top 50 ranking (and EMCOR,which was not in the ranking) — Quanta Services, MYR Group, Rosendin Electric, Cupertino Electric, Faith Technologies, Archkey Solutions, Power Design and Helix Electric.

Economists are scrutinizing the monthly job openings report from BLS more than ever because of the impact the white-hot employment numbers have on inflation. The Federal Reserve Bank reportedly will base its future decisions regarding rate hikes in part on hiring activity. Once hiring is consistently trending lower, economists believe the Fed will slow or stop rate hikes. BLS said in a press release that the total number of U.S. job openings decreased to 10.1 million on the last business day of August.