India-based Essar Steel’s plan to build an iron-ore crusher and pellet mill on Minnesota’s Iron Range has become an epic construction struggle, with non-payment to contractors, past-due loans and another total work stoppage, says Barry Davies, business representative, International Association of Ironworkers Local 612, Minneapolis.
Connecticut’s highest court in November rejected the claims of workers seeking lost wages as a result of a 2010 explosion at a power-plant under construction.
Posting on a prominent online job review site, an employee of one of the world’s top engineering and construction management firms lauds it as a “good company” with “great benefits.”
With construction spending continuing to rise toward pre-recession peaks and worker shortages growing for both open shop and union contractors, compensation of craft trades has seen a significant bump—the largest in nearly three decades for some firms.
Construction’s unemployment rate dropped again in September from August’s level and also was down sharply from its year-earlier rate, the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics has reported.
The Israeli government is hoping thousands of Chinese construction workers will help to alleviate a housing shortage that has driven up prices by more than 50% in the past five years.