December Housing Figures Highlight Need to Invest in New Construction Jobs
New figures released today by the U.S. Commerce Department reflect persistent sluggishness in the residential construction sector, with housing starts showing only a slight gain over the historic lows logged 2009. The report underlines the continued need to stimulate new job creation for American construction workers who have been sidelined by the recession.
According to an Associated Press analysis of the report, builders broke ground on a total of 587,600 homes last year, making 2010 the second worst year for new home construction since 1959. And despite a December surge in building permit applications to the highest level since last March, the outlook for 2011 remains bleak. The AP report suggests that “builders likely pulled more permits in California, New York and Pennsylvania ahead of code changes in 2011 — a factor that likely influenced the spike.”
Efficiency First continues to support legislative action at the national, state and local levels to boost investments in home energy retrofits as a cost-effective way to create new jobs for construction workers and save Americans money on their energy bills.
Download a PDF version of the December 2010 Department of Commerce report on residential construction here: www.census.gov/const/newresconst.pdf
Read the Associate Press analysis here: www.npr.org/2011/01/19/133046624/2010-was-second-worst-year-for-home-construction?sc=tw&cc=share
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Supporting retrofits is the way to go! I’m a big fan because it looks like an ideal way how to survive through the recession, gives construction workers jobs, helps the mortgage market, banks and when restricted to “green” changes only, like retrofiting to a low-energy house, or a completely off the grid house, you channel money from coal burning plants to renewable energy sources and by less energy consumption save money that can be spend on retail or services, boosting other sectors. This kind of approach should be considered worldwide.
The challenge is all of the stimulus funding has been allocated or spent and there is no money left to incentivize the retrofit industry. The new congress will be putting spending curbs on government spending, which they should, because we will be in worse shape at our current spending levels. Its a messy picture but there are a lot of great ideas. First we need to value EE, and RE too, when applied to buildings. When this is done it will allow appraisers to recognize the value of those upgrades. Why should someone get an increased value for a granite counter top that produces no monetary savings to the consumer while EE and RE are totally ignored. If this happens then the rest will fall into place. Banks will lend for EE and RE, contractors will install more EE and RE, suppliers, distributors, and manufacturers will add employees. The best idea was Ed Mazria’s to buy down the interest rate on deep energy retrofits, but that’s also out the door because the stimulus funds have been spent or allocated. Anyway, keep up the good fight.