The Construction Chart Book 6th Edition Now Available

The sixth edition of “The Construction Chart Book: The U.S. Construction Industry and Its Workers” has been released. This Center for Construction Research and Training mainstay, with its extensive statistical portrait of the construction industry, has become an essential reference for all construction stakeholders, such as policymakers, researchers, contractors, labor unions and management, construction workers, safety professionals, trainers and reporters. Take a look inside the new Chart Book and you will learn that:

• Construction unemployment dropped from a peak of 27.1 percent in February 2010 to 7.5 percent by the end of 2015 (page 20).
• There were 144,583 active apprentices in construction in fiscal year 2016, accounting for more than 70 percent of the total in all U.S. industries (page 30).
• Between 2010 and 2016, 35 states passed legislation preventing worker misclassification and increasing penalties for violations (page 22).

But the news is not all good. The number of fatal injuries in construction is up sharply from its low of 781 in 2011 to 985 in 2015 (page 38). While this was partly a reflection of job growth, it’s still unacceptable. Despite continuous efforts, falls from height claimed the lives of 353 construction workers in 2015, a 36 percent increase from 2011 (page 44).

The new chart book also contains important insights on issues from today’s headlines:

• Independent contracting, staffing agencies and other nonstandard employment arrangements accounted for 37 percent of the 2015 construction labor force in 2015 (page 21).
• About 2.3 million workers are exposed to silica hazards in their workplaces. The majority – an estimated 2 million – work in construction (page 34).
• CPWR’s eLCOSH NANO project has identified 557 construction products reported to contain engineered nanomaterials; 58 percent of these products are paints or coatings (page 25).