Construction slowdown fuels male, Hispanic job losses

By Nicole Lucht

Friday, June 26, 2009 | 3 a.m.

In Nevada, men far outnumber women on the unemployment line, and the number of Hispanics filing jobless claims has grown much faster than other ethnic groups’, according to state statistics.

From May 2006 to May 2009 the number of men filing jobless claims in Nevada increased 372 percent, from 10,409 to 49,134. For women during that time, jobless claim filings were up 250.6 percent, from 7,657 to 26,843.

The number of Hispanics who filed jobless claims from May 2006 to May 2009 jumped 662.3 percent, from 2,389 to 18,211.

There is some disparity in the numbers because the state does not require filers to report ethnicity. Of the 76,978 people the May 2009 statistics counted, 12,746 did not list their ethnicity.

Construction workers and those cut from service and hospitality jobs make up the two largest groups looking for jobs, and experts say that is why unemployed men outnumber unemployed women by such a wide margin, and why joblessness is increasing among Hispanics faster than other racial and ethnic groups.

“The disparity between males and females is largely due to the preponderance of males in the construction industry,” said economic analyst John Restrepo, principal of Restrepo Consulting Group.

UNLV economist Keith Schwer said another factor is more women work in health care services, an area with some job growth.

Those factors, he said, “can shift the composition of the unemployment rate between men and women.”

As for the large percentage of Hispanic workers filing claims, they worked mostly in construction, Restrepo said.

“When considering those (numbers), you have a lot of Hispanics and Latinos at the lower end of the pay scale — you know, the guys that are most likely to get laid off: construction low-skill and no-skill workers.”

Previously Hispanics found it easier to find employment in construction, Schwer said.

“More often than not they have less education than others in the workforce, and the unemployment rate is higher for people with less education than more education,” he said.

The data reveal management layoffs have increased significantly. Claims filed by people in management increased 435.9 percent from 1,297 to 6,950 from May 2006 to May 2009.

That is higher, percentagewise, than construction jobs, which increased 375.3 percent from 4,210 to 20,009 claims, and food preparation and serving jobs, with an increase of 402.8 percent, from 1,246 to 6,265 claims.

“If you’re drawing down a construction project and not really building anymore, you don’t need construction managers and supervisors,” Restrepo said. “Maybe those guys got cut first, so now you have one manager managing two projects, but you still need the laborers to finish it up. You just don’t need as much middle management.

“You get rid of the more expensive guys first, and then just spread around the work to the remaining guys,” he said. “Instead of having one manager per project, you have one manager for every three projects (for example).”

The trend also applies to jobs not tied to construction.

“That’s probably what we’re seeing here: the cutting of midlevel managers, some of them possibly considered overhead corporate office guys, not the operational guys on the ground,” he said.

“That intuitively makes a lot of sense to me. That’s what I would do. You get a lot more bang for the buck in terms of cost-cutting.”

UNLV work sociologist Robert Parker said his data show that management jobs are one of the fastest categories to be cut.

“I think a lot of it had to do with the merger (and) acquisition buyout trend that we’ve seen since the ’80s,” he said. “Really, you don’t need four vice presidents. You need two, maybe. You don’t need two provosts, you need one. Whatever industry you’re in, you just don’t need all this, what I would call, management featherbedding. At some point, you’re just duplicating people and you don’t need to do that anymore.

“It’s a major downside to all of those people who got MBAs in the ’80s and ’90s, to see that they really are not in demand (and) they really are dispensable.”

By industry, management of holding companies led the pack, increasing claims 771.1 percent, from 76 to 662 claims, from May 2006 to May 2009.

Professional services increased 436.2 percent, from 677 to 3,630; construction up 413.8 percent from 4,090 to 21,015 claims; hospitality up 397.7 percent from 2,765 to 13,762 claims; retail up 381.5 percent from 1,435 to 6,910 claims; and real estate increased 328 percent from 453 to 1,939 claims.

The Employment, Training and Rehabilitation Department obtains data from workers collecting unemployment benefits and the information is shared with the federal Labor Statistics Bureau.

The figures do not include jobless workers collecting benefits through a federally funded emergency extension of unemployment compensation, or workers, who for several reasons such as being fired or who resigned, do not qualify for jobless benefits, said David Schmidt, an economist for the employment department.

The figures also do not include people who are no longer eligible for benefits, underemployed workers, or those who have become discouraged and have given up looking for work.