Construction Explosion Quieted as Spending Drops in January

Construction spending dropped for the first time in eight months in January, despite the 0.4% boost that some economists foresaw. Outlays for the first month of 2004 sagged 0.3%, down from $934,411,000 in December to an estimated $931,178,000.

Although most areas of construction experienced dips in spending, residential home building remained unchanged from the previous month. The greatest increase in outlays was in conservation and development, which exhibited a total 13.3% increase in spending. Although this brought spending in this industry up to $3,880,000, the amount was still 3.9% below last year?EUR??,,????'???s outlays of $4,039,000 by 3.9%.

Despite state and city cutbacks, Federal spending rose 0.2% in January, to a total of $215,399,000. This includes a 1.7% increase in both transportation and water supply spending, and a 0.5% climb in office outlays. This also includes the 18.8%increase in conservation and development spending sported by the public sector. Once again, this is large increase in this spending, but still 7.8% below last year?EUR??,,????'???s spending in this area.

The private sector was not as lucky. Among other spending drops, amusement and recreation outlays decreased 6.6%, and office outlays fell 5.2%. Communication building did experience an 8.1% increase in spending, and manufacturing and power also experienced small gains, but not enough to offset the total 0.5% downturn of private construction outlays.

Type of Construction	Spending in Millions of Dollars (Jan '04)	%Change From:   Jan 2004	%Change From: Dec 2004
Total	931.2	-0.3	+5.4
Private Construction	715.8	-0.5	+7.2
Private Residential	501.4	0.0	+11.4
Public Construction	215.4	+0.2	-0.1
Education (Public)	56.5	-2.2	-3.6
Education (Private)	12.97	-3.4	+1.0
Total Conservation	3.9	+13.3	-3.9
Public Conservation	3.7	+18.8	7.8
Amusement & Rec (Private)	18.4	-4.4	-3.0