Today's job report is great news for the economy, specifically for the contracting and construction industries. According to the United States Labor Department, the US economy added 255,000 new jobs for the month of July, 2016. This beat the anticipated number of 180,000 by a significant margin and construction was responsible for 14,000 of those newly created jobs. "This was another strong report that checked most, if not all of the significant boxes," said Curt Long, chief economist at the National Association of Federal Credit Unions. "The labor market should remain strong as long as consumers maintain their robust spending pace." Hourly wages also moved higher, increasing by 8 cents or an annualized pace of 2.6 percent, while the average work week edged up to 34.5 hours. Source: http://www.cnbc.com/2016/08/05/nonfarm-payrolls-july-2016.html