A huge 2023 for construction in America. Biden stimulus has to be given credit for it

As part of a series of strong pieces of data, I note that construction spending and the construction sector in general has become a sizable boost to our economy in the Biden presidency. That continued with another positive month of construction spending in December, as we found out last week.

Construction spending during December 2023 was estimated at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $2,096.0 billion, 0.9 percent (± 0.8 percent) above the revised November estimate of $2,078.3 billion. The December figure is 13.9 percent (±1.5 percent) above the December 2022 estimate of $1,840.9 billion. The value of construction in 2023 was $1,978.7 billion, 7.0 percent (±1.0 percent) above the $1,848.7 billion spent in 2022.

An increase of nearly 14% year-over-year is quite a jump, given how inflation grew by less than 4% in the same time period. And one of the reasons behind the gain is that a decline in single-family home construction reversed starting in April, with the amount of new single-family homes being put into service going up by more than 14% in the last 8 months of the year.

That increase in residential construction goes along with Biden/Dem policies that have kicked in over the last two years which have encouraged more street and road repairs, as well as a boom in building for manufacturing businesses.

With all of that new construction happening, it's not a surprise that there has been a steady increase of construction jobs over the last two years. That's happening at the same time that manufacturing hiring has mostly leveled off (which is something to keep an eye on, given all of the new manufacturing facilities that are being built).

It's remarkable that the construction strength has continued even as interest rates have gone up, which increases borrowing costs for those projects. It's quite an accomplishment, and it's something that the Biden Administration and other Dems should talk about more, as this construction boom is something that should be easy to show in communities around the country, and seems to be directly related to 2021 stimulus policies that resulted from Dems having complete control of government in DC.