The Associated General Contractors of America, which did the survey, is trying to address the shortage with career-building programs.
The new study from the AGC reports that 94 percent of contractors say they are having a hard time hiring enough people for their open positions.
The survey talked to firms across the building trade and found the biggest shortages were in open hourly craft positions, followed by open salaried positions. The association said that labor shortages were most likely to impact project delays with 54 percent of responding contractors saying they were running into delays.
“The most likely path to addressing construction workforce shortages is for the federal government to adopt better workforce policies,” AGC CEO Jeff Shoaf said.
The association is recommending a number of initiatives to address the situation in the meantime, including increased base pay rates, doing more recruiting online and working with high schools and training facilities on career building programs. More than four out of ten firms surveyed said they were increasing spending on such programs with a fourth saying they were doing more online or video training programs. The AGC says it is partnering with its local and state level chapters to run more digital ad campaigns to attract new workers as well as host more training and pre-apprenticeship programs.
