Where is the money?

The U.S. economy has been booming of late, and at press time, the unemployment rate was hovering around 3.9 percent, its lowest level since the early 2000s. Yet wages in three industries—construction, long-haul trucking and child care—remain lower than expected despite widespread worker shortages, according to Bloomberg Law.

Bloomberg Law looked closely at the construction market in Atlanta where there is a current backlog of work caused by a worker shortage. The Construction Education Foundation of Georgia has trained 250 workers annually at no charge to fill entry-level positions, and staffing company PeopleReady has been recruiting out-of-state workers with food and hotel stipends. Although these efforts have helped offset the labor shortage, Bloomberg Law says construction employers have kept annual wage increases at 3 percent to track with inflation.

Employers are saying Atlanta's average construction pay of $15 per hour prohibits them from increasing wages, which, they say, would draw unskilled workers instead of skilled technicians and may end up elevating home prices, for example. And the fact that contracting companies already are running thin margins makes higher wages a near impossibility.

Economists cite decreases in union negotiating power as another reason why wages are not rising as quickly as would have been anticipated.

And according to The Guardian: "Another apparent culprit is what's called 'monopsony.' Monopoly occurs when sellers are so concentrated that they don't really have to compete. Monopsony is when the buyers—in this case, employers—are concentrated."

Regardless of the data, it bears noting the roofing industry pays, on average, a higher hourly wage than many other construction industries. For more information about how your company's wages compare nationally and regionally, refer to the 2017 NRCA Wage and Benefits Survey. You can purchase the survey at shop.nrca.net; NRCA members can download the publication free of charge.

Ambika Puniani Reid is editor of Professional Roofing and NRCA's vice president of communications and production.