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ABC: Construction Adds 15K Jobs in June

William Attardi on July 8, 2025

The construction industry added 15,000 jobs on net in June, according to an Associated Builders and Contractors analysis of data released by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. On a year-over-year basis, industry employment has increased by 121,000 jobs, or 1.5%. The construction unemployment rate fell to 3.4% last month. Unemployment across all industries declined from 4.2% in May to 4.1% in June.  June’s employment report, coupled with recent inflation data, indicate that the U.S. economy continues to demonstrate solid momentum, stable unemployment and declining inflation. Construction added jobs for a second consecutive month.  ABC: Construction Adds 15K Jobs in June – tEDmag

Industry Leaders Rave About the Tax Cuts in Trump’s Megabill

William Attardi on July 8, 2025

The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, signed into law on July 4, preserves the 21% corporate tax rate and creates new expensing opportunities for manufacturers looking to expand. It provides a host of changes to the U.S. tax code, including extensions to parts of the 2017 Tax and Jobs Act and new provisions that allow for enhanced expensing for manufacturers looking to expand operations or invest in research and development. While most manufacturing groups expressed support for the bill in the days leading up to its passage, opponents have raised concerns over its cuts to non-military government programs such as SNAP and Medicaid, as well as its curtailing of certain clean-energy tax credits.Industry leaders rave about the tax cuts in Trump’s megabill | Manufacturing Dive

Global Semiconductor Sales Increase 19.8% Year-to-Year in May

William Attardi on July 7, 2025

The Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA)today announced global semiconductor sales were $59.0 billion during the month of May 2025, an increase of 19.8% compared to the May 2024 total of $49.2 billion and 3.5% more than the April 2025 total of $57.0 billion.  The growth is driven by increased demand in various sectors, including AI, cloud infrastructure, and advanced consumer electronics. Global Semiconductor Sales Increase 19.8% Year-to-Year in May – electrifiED

Data Center Construction Continues to Grow by Tom Zind

William Attardi on July 7, 2025

How do you paint a rosy picture for a construction market sector that’s been in the dumps and shows scant signs of a quick change of fortune? There’s one way: Stretch the definition, and throw in a category that’s come so far so fast that standard market indices haven’t been able to catch up. That’s what FMI Corp., does in the second-quarter installment of its 2025 North American Engineering and Construction Industry Outlook Reasonably, it lumps data centers into the office component of its non-residential construction analysis, yielding a bullish four-year forecast for the sector that beats nine of 10 others. Citing forecasts of data center demand growing 34% in 2025 and 18% next year, FMI sees office construction growing every year between 2026 and 2029 at an average of about 7% annually. Data centers may be the office of the future, housing the infrastructure enabling higher productivity that could be a driving force for the economy for decades to come. Data Center Construction Continues to Grow | EC&M

New Trade Pacts Confirmed, Tariff Changes Delayed to Aug. 1

William Attardi on July 7, 2025

US negotiators have reached new trade agreements with several nations, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent each said Sunday, adding that President Donald Trump has moved the start date for all tariff changes from Wednesday to August 1 to provide additional negotiating time with more countries. Countries without a deal by then will see tariffs return to April 2 levels, Lutnick and Bessent said. Lutnick Says Trump’s Tariffs Will Take Effect on Aug. 1 – Bloomberg

US Labor Market Remains Resilient, Unemployment Rate Falls

William Attardi on July 3, 2025

The job gains were significantly larger than expected and the unemployment rate ticked down in May. S. employers added 147,000 jobs in June and beat economists’ expectations of fewer than 118,000 new jobs as the American labor market continues to show surprising resilience despite uncertainty over President Donald Trump’s economic policies. The unemployment rate ticked down to 4.1% from 4.2% in May, the Labor Department said Thursday. US Labor Market Remains Resilient, Unemployment Rate Falls – tEDmag

Energy Secretary Announces Updated NEPA Procedures

William Attardi on July 3, 2025

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) announced new updates to the Department’s National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) procedures. As part of a government-wide effort to restore common sense to permitting, DOE published an interim final rule rescinding all NEPA regulations and published new NEPA guidance procedures for the Department of Energy. The Council on Environmental Quality coordinated a historic, interagency effort to simplify NEPA compliance, lower construction costs, eliminate years-long delays, and ensure environmental reviews can no longer be used to stall American energy production and infrastructure development. This action fulfils President Trump’s Executive Order 14154, Unleashing American Energy, and implements reforms enacted by Congress under the 2023 BUILDER Act.  These reforms will enable the deployment of more efficient technologies and the better environmental outcomes that they provide.  Energy Secretary Announces Updated NEPA Procedures – electrifiED

U.S. Regular Gasoline Prices (dollars per gallon – LOWEST SINCE 2021)

William Attardi on July 3, 2025

full history XLS

06/16/25 06/23/25 06/30/25 week ago year ago
U.S. 3.139 3.213 3.164 -0.049 -0.315
East Coast 2.983 3.072 3.031 -0.041 -0.358
New England 2.956 3.079 3.050 -0.029 -0.398
Central Atlantic 3.106 3.212 3.217 0.005 -0.309
Lower Atlantic 2.912 2.983 2.911 -0.072 -0.379
Midwest 3.026 3.087 3.051 -0.036 -0.364
Gulf Coast 2.735 2.844 2.739 -0.105 -0.332
Rocky Mountain 3.114 3.177 3.175 -0.002 -0.176
West Coast 4.127 4.162 4.109 -0.053 -0.127
West Coast less CA 3.800 3.855 3.835 -0.020 -0.077
Gasoline and Diesel Fuel Update – U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA)

China Is Quickly Eroding America’s Lead in the Global AI Race by Liza Lin, Josh Chin, Raffaele Huang

William Attardi on July 2, 2025

Chinese artificial-intelligence companies are loosening the U.S.’s global stranglehold on AI, challenging American superiority and setting the stage for a global arms race in the technology. In Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Asia, users ranging from multinational banks to public universities are turning to large language models from Chinese companies such as startup DeepSeek and e-commerce giant Alibaba’s alternatives to American offerings such as ChatGPT. OpenAI’s ChatGPT remains the world’s predominant AI consumer chatbot, with 910 million global downloads compared with DeepSeek’s 125 million, figures from researcher Sensor Tower show. American AI is widely seen as the industry’s gold standard, thanks to advantages in computing semiconductors, cutting-edge research and access to financial capital. The competition, some industry insiders say, has set the world on the path toward a technological Cold War in which countries will have to decide to align with either American or Chinese AI systems. China Is Quickly Eroding America’s Lead in the Global AI Race – WSJ

Amazon Is on the Cusp of Using More Robots Than Humans in Its Warehouses

William Attardi on July 1, 2025

The    e-commerce giant, which has spent years automating tasks previously done by humans in its facilities, has deployed more than one million robots in those workplaces, Amazon said. That is the most it has ever had and near the count of human workers at the facilities. One of Amazon’s newer robots, called Vulcan, has a sense of touch that enables it to pick items from numerous shelves. Amazon has taken recent steps to connect its robots to its order-fulfillment processes, so the machines can work in tandem with each other and with humans.  For some Amazon workers, the increasing automation has meant replacing menial, repetitive work lifting, pulling and sorting with more skilled assignments managing the machines.  Amazon is also rolling out artificial intelligence in its warehouses, Chief Executive Andy Jassy said recently, “to improve inventory placement, demand forecasting, and the efficiency of our robots.” Amazon said it will cut the size of its total workforce in the next several years. Exclusive | Amazon Is on the Cusp of Using More Robots Than Humans in Its Warehouses – WSJ

What Do the Colors on Bread Tags Mean? – These color-coded tags indicate the date the bread was baked and packaged.  Now that you know that the color-coded tags actually mean something, how can you remember which color means which day? Luckily there is an easy way to remember the schedule. The colors correspond to weekdays in alphabetical order: Blue (Monday), Green (Tuesday), Red (Thursday), White (Friday), then Yellow (Saturday). Maybe you just learned something you did not know…..