ABC: Unionized construction workforce slide continues

Sources: Associated Builders and Contractors, Washington, D.C. An Associated Builders and Contractors analysis of 2023 union membership data published by UnionStats.com finds at least 90 percent of workers in the private construction industry do not belong to a union in 29 states, up from 26 and 24 states in the prior two years. North Carolina, Mississippi, Maine, South Carolina and…

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ABC, Texas chapter seek federal court relief from Davis-Bacon rule rewrite

An Associated Builders and Contractors and the ABC Southeast Texas lawsuit asks the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, Beaumont Division to vacate the Department of Labor’s Updating the Davis-Bacon and Related Acts Regulations (DBA) rule, implemented in October and applicable to federal or federally assisted construction projects. Plaintiffs challenge the new rule’s prevailing wage definition, wage…

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ABC, AGC uniformly harsh in federal project labor agreement rule critiques

Sources: Associated Builders and Contractors, Associated General Contractors of America, Washington, D.C.  Merit shop and union contractors’ top national representatives will seek court action in response to a final Federal Acquisition Regulatory Council rule, Federal Acquisition Regulation: Use of Project Labor Agreements for Federal Construction Projects. Effective December 2023, it implements an early-2022 White House executive order requiring federal construction…

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ABC challenges Labor Department’s Davis-Bacon rule updates

Sources: Associated Builders and Contractors, Washington, D.C.; CP staff An Associated Builders and Contractors and the ABC Southeast Texas lawsuit states a case for the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, Beaumont Division to vacate the Department of Labor’s Updating the Davis-Bacon and Related Acts Regulations (DBA) rule, implemented in October and applicable to federal or federally…

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Merit shop contractors report $1.5 billion in workforce development expenditures

Associated Builders and Contractors member contractors invested more than $1.5 billion to provide nearly 1.3 million course attendees with craft, leadership and safety education in 2022, according to the 2023 Workforce Development Survey, down from $1.6 billion in 2021. The annual assessment quantifies the scope of ABC members’ workforce development initiatives to advance their employees’ careers in commercial and industrial…

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Non-union crews approach 90 percent of construction workforce

According to an Associated Builders and Contractors analysis of 2022 state union membership data published recently by UnionStats.com, at least nine out of 10 construction workers in private industry do not belong to a union in 26 states, up from 24 states in 2021. Nationwide, a record 88.3 percent of construction workers do not belong to a union, U.S. Bureau…

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MANUFACTURERS – April 2023

Besser Co. and the ACPA Foundation named recipients of the 2023 Besser Pipe Scholarships ($2,500) during the American Concrete Pipe Association Pipe School earlier this year. The first recipient is Ava Wesner, a senior at Posen High School in Michigan, who will attend a Michigan college this fall to study environmental engineering. The second recipient is Michael McDole, a member…

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Construction trades rank & file continue union exodus

Sources: Associated Builders and Contractors, Washington, D.C.; CP staff The Union Members Survey from the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics finds the percentage of construction industry wage and salary workers belonging to unions dropped to a record low of 11.7 percent in 2022, versus 12.6 percent the prior year. The recently published document shows construction unions lost…

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ABC: Registered apprenticeship system no match for skilled labor needs

It would take 14 years for federal and state government-registered apprenticeship programs to educate the 650,000 workers the construction industry needs to hire in 2022, according to an Associated Builders and Contractors analysis of U.S. Department of Labor data from 2021. DOL figures indicate that the construction industry’s federal government-registered apprenticeship system produced just 24,822 completers of its four- to…

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Contractors’ annual workforce development outlays surpass $1.5 billion

Associated Builders and Contractors member contractors invested $1.6 billion to provide more than 1.3 million course attendees with craft, leadership and safety education in 2021, up from $1.3 billion in 2020. The group’s 2022 Workforce Development Survey quantifies the scope of member initiatives to advance their employees’ commercial and industrial construction careers. Safety education accounted for the greatest share, or…

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