Dive Brief:

• While construction firms in most large cities have added so many jobs over the past year that they’re having a hard time filling them all, 73 metropolitan areas have lost jobs.

• Phoenix, which 10 years ago was the country’s fastest-growing homebuilding market, lost the most construction jobs of any city, the Associated General Contractors of American reported.

• Phoenix lost 6,900 jobs between September 2013 and September 2014, AGC said. By comparison, Houston, which gained the most construction jobs, added 13,500 positions during the same 12 months.

Dive Insight:

AGC’s Chief Economist Ken Simonson explained the difference: "Even as construction employment continues to rebound in many parts of the country, other areas continue to lose ground, or like Phoenix, backslide," he said. "Similarly, while construction spending has been increasing overall in the past year, the gains remain uneven. The industry appears likely to experience very mixed results by segment and region for the rest of 2014 and into next year."