Monday, January 27, 2014

An Alternative Housing Recovery Story

The following chart shows new home sales divided by existing home sales.


Click to enlarge.

1. New home sales create construction jobs.
2. Existing home sales do not create construction jobs.

The next chart shows residential construction employees per capita.


Click to enlarge.

Note the exceptionally weak recovery in residential construction employment.

rearrange the deck chairs on the Titanic

To do something pointless or insignificant that will soon be overtaken by events, or that contributes nothing to the solution of a current problem.

Source Data:
St. Louis Fed: New Home Sales / Existing Home Sales
St. Louis Fed: Residential Construction Employees per Capita

2 comments:

Cinco-X said...

Unfortunately, there's not much point in building more homes when there's little demand for it...

Stagflationary Mark said...

Cinco-X,

Ever get the feeling that there's a little bit of Detroit in all of us?

Next Detroit blight removal site: 21 blocks, 67 homes in Brightmoor