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Economy in Brief
U.S. Wholesale Inventories Post Strong February Gain; Sales Fall
Wholesale inventories increased 0.6% (2.0% y/y) during February...
U.S. Initial Unemployment Insurance Claims Unexpectedly Increase
Initial claims for unemployment insurance rose to 744,000 during the week ended April 3...
Total PMIs Gain Traction in March
The PMI readings for March show improvement again...
U.S. Consumer Credit Outstanding Bounces Back in February
Consumer credit outstanding surged $27.6 billion during February...
U.S. Trade Deficit Widens to Record during February
The U.S. trade deficit in goods and services widened to $71.1 during February...
Viewpoints
Commentaries are the opinions of the author and do not reflect the views of Haver Analytics.
by Tom Moeller March 1, 2021
• Overall activity sets another record.
• Residential building's surge led by single-family sector.
• Public-sector building strengthens.
Building activity continues to strengthen. The value of construction put-in-place increased 1.7% during January (5.8% y/y) following December's 1.1% gain, revised from 1.0%. A 0.7% January increase had been expected in the Action Economics Forecast Survey.
Private construction increased 1.7% (6.8% y/y) in January following a 1.5% December rise. Residential construction jumped 2.5% (21.0% y/y) as single-family building surged 3.0% (24.2% y/y), the seventh consecutive month of notably strong increase. Home improvement expenditures strengthened 2.3% (17.9% y/y) after rising 1.8%. The value of multi-family construction edged 0.7% higher (16.9% y/y) following a 0.2% rise.
Nonresidential private construction improved 0.4% in January (-10.1% y/y) following six consecutive monthly declines. Transportation building rose 1.0% (-2.7% y/), strong for the fifth straight month. Lodging construction rose 0.7% (-22.7% y/y) while commercial building weakened 1.8% (-8.3% y/y). Manufacturing construction rose 4.9% (-14.7% y/y) as education construction edged 0.4% higher (-15.7% y/y). Office building eased 0.2% (-4.4% y/y) about as it did in December.
Public construction rose 1.7% during January (2.9% y/y) following a 0.1% December uptick. Spending on highways & streets, which makes up nearly one-third of public spending, surged 5.8% (6.5% y/y) and outlays on health care units improved 0.9% (9.1% y/y). Power construction improved 0.2% (-4.0% y/y) while spending on educational buildings was little changed (0.9% y/y).
The construction spending figures, some of which date back to 1946 can be found in Haver's USECON database. The expectations reading is in the AS1REPNA database.
Construction Put in Place (SA, %) | Jan | Dec | Nov | Jan Y/Y | 2020 | 2019 | 2018 |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Total | 1.7 | 1.1 | 1.4 | 5.8 | 4.6 | 2.3 | 4.1 |
Private | 1.7 | 1.5 | 1.5 | 6.8 | 4.5 | 0.6 | 4.0 |
Residential | 2.5 | 3.8 | 3.1 | 21.0 | 11.1 | -2.5 | 3.5 |
Nonresidential | 0.4 | -1.9 | -0.7 | -10.1 | -3.0 | 4.4 | 4.7 |
Public | 1.7 | 0.1 | 1.1 | 2.9 | 5.2 | 8.0 | 4.4 |