Workforce

On Jan. 20, 2025, President Donald Trump was sworn in as the 47th president and quickly issued a sweeping set of executive orders aimed at reversing Biden administration policies related to diversity, immigration, national security and climate. The orders require enactment throug...

Competition is a constant in the ever-evolving world of construction. It’s fundamental to the bottom line, creates a quality product, invites the best talent and—to be frank—it’s exciting to compete. And it’s even more exciting to be the winner. So, how are winners in the contra...

When Chandra Wakeland was a young girl, most of her friends spent their summers soaking up the sun by the pool or at summer camp. Wakeland spent hers going to work with her father, a chief estimator for a steel contractor. “I would go to work with my dad during summer school whil...

LAS VEGAS, Feb. 28—Associated Builders and Contractors named the winners of the 2025 ABC Construction Management Competition and the 36th annual National Craft Championships. The winners were honored on the final day of ABC Convention 2025 in Las Vegas. ABC Names the Nation’s To...

WASHINGTON, March 12—Associated Builders and Contractors released an analysis of 2024 state union membership data published by unionstats.com, which found that in 41 states at least 80% of workers in the private construction industry did not belong to a union. At least 90% of wor...

Over the last half-decade, artificial intelligence—particularly its applications within the construction industry—has evolved rapidly and continues to do so exponentially thanks to proponents of it within the industry. CEO of Trunk Tools, Sarah Buchner, is emerging as a leader in...

A Mexican American and the daughter of immigrants, Lorena Carrillo always looked up to her parents—admiring their work ethic and striving to make them proud in everything she did. But she didn’t know exactly what it was she wanted to do. Today she is a senior project engineer at...

WASHINGTON, March 11—The construction industry had 236,000 job openings on the last day of January, according to an Associated Builders and Contractors analysis of data released in the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey. JOLTS defines a job op...

WASHINGTON, March 7—The construction industry added 19,000 jobs on net in February, according to an Associated Builders and Contractors analysis of data released by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. On a year-over-year basis, industry employment has increased by 174,000 jobs, ...

Katie Kafarakis has always been involved in her family’s construction business. A third-generation employee, she spent her childhood on jobsites with her father and her adulthood in marketing, sales and operations. In a family business, love and support abound, and Kafarakis was ...