Iowa is in the midst of a historic boom in construction employment
Jobs hit highest level recorded in 30 years
Iowa’s construction employment has hit the highest level recorded in data going back more than 30 years.
Released this week, the Iowa Workforce Development monthly report says the construction sector employed 85,200 workers in January, up 600 from December and an increase of 2,700 from January 2023.
The rise has been even more dramatic — 3,200 workers — since October, the report says. Though winter usually sees a decline in construction, Iowa has recorded its warmest
“Across Iowa we are seeing increased demand in the commercial and industrial construction markets.”
Samantha Groark Executive director of Central Iowa Building Trades Council
winter on record, and work on some projects that might have shut down until spring has continued, while others have gotten an early start.
Data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics shows Iowa construction employment in January was the highest since at least 1990, the first year for which figures are available.
“Across Iowa we are seeing increased demand in the commercial and industrial construction markets,” said Samantha Groark, executive director of Central Iowa Building Trades Council.
Groark said the heightened demand for skilled tradespeople, including plumbers, pipefitters, electricians, laborers, operating engineers and carpenters, comes in response to historic investments by the Biden administration through the bipartisan Infrastructure Law and Inflation Reduction Act.
“We are seeing demand for infrastructure projects and the development of wind, solar, broadband, storage, and transmission in Iowa thanks to billions of dollars of private-sector investments across Iowa fueled in part by historic federal legislation,” she said. “These investments are creating good-paying jobs, including union jobs and jobs that don’t require a four-year degree, that will help rebuild Iowa’s crumbling infrastructure and build a stronger, cleanerenergy economy.”
She said job growth also has been spurred on by increased interest from younger people.
“In high schools, the attitude used to be ‘college or bust,’ and we couldn’t even get in to do presentations on trades. Now, the schools can’t get enough,” Groark said.
Big construction trades job fair planned for Iowa high schoolers
Jay Iverson, executive officer of the Home Builders Association of Iowa, agreed with Groark about the increased interest in trade careers. He cited a Build My Future event scheduled for April 17 at the Iowa State Fairgrounds, where 6,000 high school students will learn about trades-related job opportunities.
“We have been working really hard for the last several years on the whole workforce development side of the construction industry,” Iverson said.
Despite the surge in construction employment, the state report shows Iowa still had a total of 58,000 open jobs and 50,900 unemployed workers through January, with the unemployment rate hovering at 3%.
”January’s report was mixed. On the positive side, it shows the total number of nonfarm jobs remains 12,700 above last year’s total, even after retail businesses pared 2,000 jobs following the holidays,” Beth Townsend, executive director of Iowa Workforce Development, said in a news release accompanying the report. “We also saw 2,300 people leave the workforce voluntarily in January.”
One factor in people leaving the labor force in January was seasonal workers returning to college, said Jesse Dougherty, a spokesperson for the agency.