McGraw-Hill Construction Sees Flat Construction Environment in 2012
Lingering doubts in the minds of business executives and consumers about the health of the U.S. economy, uncertainty over the political turmoil in Washington, D.C., and weak demand will probably choke off any significant growth in the 2012 construction market.
That's the consensus of the construction economists at McGraw-Hill Construction Outlook 2012, held Oct. 19 in Washington, D.C. Compared to the double-digit declines that the industry suffered through the past three years, things could be worse than a year of no growth. But compared to the pinch-me-I-can't believe-it's-real 2006-2007 construction market, the new normal doesn't feel so hot.
With the exception of the multiple-family housing market, which McGraw-Hill expects to grow 17 percent in 2012 to 205,000 units, progress will be slow -- and hopefully won't be torpedoed by a double-dip recession. Overall, McGraw-Hill Construction expects the level of construction starts in 2012 to be $412 billion, following the 4% decline to $410 billion predicted for 2011.
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Jim Lucy Blog
Chief Editor
Jim Lucy has been wandering through the electrical market for more than 30 years, most of the time as an editor for Electrical Wholesaling, Electrical Marketing newsletter and CEE News. During that time he and the editorial team for the publications have won numerous national awards for their coverage of the electrical business. He showed an early interest in electricity, when as a youth he had an idea for a hot dog cooker. Unfortunately, the first crude prototype malfunctioned and the arc nearly blew him out of his parents' basement. Before becoming an editor for Electrical Wholesaling magazine and Electrical Marketing, he earned a BA degree in journalism and a MA in communications from Glassboro State College, Glassboro, NJ., which is formerly best known as the site of the 1967 summit meeting between President Lyndon Johnson and Russian Premier Aleksei Nikolayevich Kosygin, and now best known as the New Jersey state college that changed its name in 1992 to Rowan University because of a generous $100 million donation by N.J. zillionaire industrialist Henry Rowan. Jim is a Brooklyn-born Jersey Guy happily transplanted in the fertile plains of Kansas for the past 20 years.