From the Futurist Update, September 2005:
A building boom, an aging workforce, and higher technical demands of workers are laying the foundations of a potential skills crisis in the U.S. construction industry.
Now employing nearly 7 million carpenters, electricians, inspectors, and other skilled workers, the industry will need one million more workers by 2012 to fill jobs being left by retiring baby boomers, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
These workers will also need increasingly sophisticated skills: For example, building inspectors now use laptop computers to monitor inspection activities, and laborers operate high-tech machinery.
Construction workers once could learn most of their necessary skills through apprenticeships and on-the-job training, but now they need vocational or technical school training.
“It is absolutely imperative that we address the skills shortage by reaching out to today’s youth,” says Don Whyte, president of the National Center for Construction Education and Research. The first annual National Careers in Construction Week, October 17-21, “is one initiative the industry is taking to promote a positive image of construction to young people and encourage them to consider a construction career.”
SOURCE: National Center for Construction Education and Research, http://www.nccer.org
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