Dive Brief:

• Employment in the construction sector of the U.S. economy went up by 11,000 last month, according to an analysis of federal data, reaching 5.384 million people—the most since August 2009.
• The new figures bring the construction unemployment rate for October at 9% among workers last employed in the industry.
• Nonresidential construction accounted for 6,600 of the newly employed workers, and residential put 4,800 more people to work.

Dive Insight:

The most significant observation in the Associated General Contractors analysis of the federal employment data may be that the unemployment rate in construction is falling faster than employment is growing. That suggests that people who last worked in construction are either retiring or taking jobs doing something else, and that bodes mill for trying to fill skilled jobs as openings come up.