Steel Markets
August 2, 2017
Construction Spending’s Expanding… Slowly
Written by Peter Wright
Total construction expenditures are expanding slowly, but the contraction of infrastructure expenditures is accelerating, according to June data for construction put in place (CPIP) released by the U.S. Department of Commerce on Aug. 1.
Total construction still shows positive growth, but slowed to 1.3 percent year/year in the latest three months of data. Privately funded projects are the growth engine as state/local and infrastructure are both contracting. All three financing categories have negative momentum. Construction is extremely seasonal, therefore the growth or contraction that we report in this analysis has had seasonality removed by considering only year/year comparisons.
