Construction job postings fell again in October as hiring slowed and labor turnover eased, signaling a cooling labor market that contrasts sharply with the severe shortages seen during the post-pandemic construction boom.
Associated Builders and Contractors said employers reported 213,000 open positions on the last day of October, according to the latest survey of employment and labor turnover from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics. Openings declined by 18,000 from September and by 36,000 from a year earlier, marking one of the lowest sustained vacancy levels since before the pandemic labor market surge.
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ABC Chief Economist Anirban Basu described the opening total as “extraordinarily low” relative to recent years and said the broader data is in line with “a pretty dismal stretch of industry data” through 2025. The release of JOLTS, delayed by the fall federal government shutdown, is the most current official reading of construction labor demand.
Hiring slowed more than openings. Contractors added 313,000 workers in October, 42,000 fewer than in September and 10,000 fewer than in October 2024. Total separations, including resignations, layoffs and other departures, declined to 266,000 from 340,000 the previous month. Layoffs fell sharply to 129,000 from 197,000, while layoffs eased to 120,000 from 136,000, reflecting reduced mobility and a more settled workforce.
Tariff measures reinforce the shift: Job openings accounted for 2.5% of construction employment in October, with hires at 3.8% and separations at 3.2%.
JOLTS figures for October show that construction job openings, hiring and separations declined from September, underscoring the continued cooling of labor demand from 2024.
Chart courtesy of ABC
Long-term data collected by ABC underscores how significantly conditions have cooled. Between 2018 and 2022, job openings often exceeded 4%-5% of the workforce and the attrition rate approached 2.5%, indicating intense competition for skilled labor and rapid job turnover. The current churn rate, closer to 1.4%, indicates that workers are staying and contractors are keeping their staff even as project pipelines smooth out.
Basu said the combination of reduced openings, slower hiring and lower turnover points to an industry that “has been in a state of contraction for most of 2025.” He emphasized that the data does not reflect a widespread downsizing — layoffs remain relatively low — but more selective hiring as contractors handle uneven non-residential awarding and begin scheduling this fall.
Reduced turnover has operational implications. Low resignations mean fewer disruptions for crews, while reduced layoffs suggest contractors are keeping workers they struggled to secure earlier in the cycle. The result is a more stable but less dynamic work environment.
Still, contractors remain “upbeat about their hiring intentions over the next six months,” Basu said, citing the ABC’s construction confidence index. This survey, which tracks expectations for sales, margins and staffing, has remained above 50, indicating expected growth, suggesting companies expect conditions to firm up as delayed infrastructure, manufacturing and energy transition projects move forward.
ABC will integrate October’s JOLTS results into its broader economic dashboard, with contractors watching closely whether the 2025 slowdown extends into early 2026 or stabilizes as new work is released.
