Dive Brief:

• The federal Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) gathered and crunched data about who was doing what jobs in the residential construction industry in 2012, and it found that carpenters far and away are the heart of the business, with 47% of the jobs.
• Counting all trade-specific occupations accounts for 64% of jobs, and office and administrative support jobs account for 14% of the total.
• Managers, the people most likely to be reading the numbers and comparing their own companies, were 9% of the industry workforce.

Dive Insight:

When BLS counts carpenters, it means anyone who job is to construct, erect, install or repair structures made of wood, as well as those who install cabinets and siding. That definition swells the carpentry ranks, but it still seems to make sense for an industry built on – and of – wood and nails.