Moses Abramovitz

English

Research Papers in Economics

This PDF is a selection from an out-of-print volume from the National
Bureau of Economic Research
Volume Title: Evidences of Long Swings in Aggregate Construction Since
the Civil War
Volume Author/Editor: Moses Abramovitz
Volume Publisher: UMI
Volume ISBN: 0-87014-404-9
Volume URL: http://www.nber.org/books/abra64-1
Publication Date: 1964
Chapter Title: Evidence of Long Swings from Labor-Force Data
Chapter Author: Moses Abramovitz
Chapter URL: http://www.nber.org/chapters/c1808
Chapter pages in book: (p. 123 - 126)9
Evidence of Long Swings from
Labor-Force Data
The conclusion regarding long swings in aggregate construction just
reached on the basis of a variety of direct measures of activity can be
checked by reference to the growth of the labor force attached to con-
struction. We proceed from the hypothesis that the number of persons
who, in any given year, look to a given industry or occupation for their
regular livelihood depends upon the number who could actually obtain
regular employment in the industry for a number of years in the past.
Thus, the number of gainful workers attached to the construction in-
dustry at successive Census dates should reflect employment conditions
in the industry during the intervening years. If construction activity
did, indeed, grow in a series of long surges followed by protracted
periods of pronounced retardation or decline, it is reasonable to sup-
pose that this would have left its mark on the growth of the number
who followed an occupation connected with construction or who other-
wise looked to construction for their regular employment. We should
not, indeed, expect that, in a secularly expanding industry like con-
struction, the number of men who seek a livelihood in it will actually
decline during a depression, even a protracted one. And this is par-
ticularly true if depression in construction is accompanied, as it was,
by a slackening of growth in nonagricultural industries generally. If the
slumps in construction were especially pronounced, however, it is rea-
sonable to expect that the rate of growth of workers attached to the
industry would have declined and that the proportion which construc-
tion workers bear to the total labor force would have shrunk. These
expectations can be tested against estimates of the number of gainful
123Evidences of Long Swings in Aggregate Construction
workers attached to construction and of the ratio of these to all gainful
workers.
The figures in Table 18 are drawn from estimates by Carson and
Barger.' They are essentially estimates of "gainful workers" from 1870
to 1930 and of the "labor force" for 1940 and 1950. Carson refers to the
figures as estimates of "economic manpower" or "force of workers." The
switch from the gainful-worker to the labor-force concept in 1940 makes
the comparison of 1930 and 1940 suspect, but Carson apparently con-
sidered the figures sufficiently comparable, so far as this goes; and, with
some reserve, we follow his lead.2 However, a fairly sizable adjustment
has been made in the Carson figure for 1940. We regard this as a mini-
mal adjustment, required because the Census figures greatly overstate
the number of unemployed, and perhaps also of employed, workers
attached to the industry in that year. It is reasonably clear that a com-
plete adjustment would require a change considerably larger than the
revision made here and would display the impact of the Great Depres-
sion on the number attached to construction still more forceably. The
reasons an adjustment is needed and the details of the adjustment are set
forth in Appendix B. This appendix also contains comments on other
problems that arise regarding the scope and movement of the man-
power figures.
Subject to the adjustment in 1940, the behavior of the construction
labor force is perfectly consistent with the expectations we form on the
hypothesis that there were long waves in aggregate construction activ-
ity.3 The growth of the construction labor force, whether measured in
numbers or in percentages of its previous level, rises and falls from
decade to decade in an unbroken alternation, and so does the share
iCarson, "Changes in the Industrial Distribution of Manpower since the Civil
War" (10); Barger, Distribution's Place in the American Economy since 1869 (8).
2So apparently did Fabricant in his critical article on historical estimates of
the industrial distribution of the working force which accompanies Carson's article.
See Fabricant, "The Changing Industrial Distribution of Gainful Workers" (17).
31n a sense, neither the lack of comparability between the 1930 and 1940
figures, due to the shift from the gainful-worker to the labor-force concept, nor the
overestimate of the labor force attached to construction in 1940 can be matters of
serious consequence for the interpretation we propose to place on the data. For
there can be no doubt at all that the level of construction activity was much lower
during the 1930's than it was during the decade preceding and that following.
Table 18 is chiefly important for the light it can shed on fluctuations in construction
activity before 1930.
124Evidence of Long Swings from Labor-Force Data
TABLE18
MANPOWER IN CONSTRUCTION AT CENSUS DATES, 1870—1950
Share of
Change Since Con—
Number in
Construction
PrecedingCensus struction
in Total
Manpowera Number
(thousands) (thousands) Per Cent (per cent)
1870 752 5.8
1880 830 78 10.4 4.8
1890 1,445 615 74.1 6.1
1900 1,663 218 15.1 5.7
1910 2,297 634 38.1 6.2
1920
1930
1940
1950
2,167
b
3,0303,029
3,508
3,743
(3117)C
—130
863
479( 88)C
235(626)C
—5.7
39.8
15.8(
29)C.
67(201)C
5.2
6.266(58)C
6.2
Source: 1870—1940: Oaniel Carson, "Changes in the Industrial Composition
of Manpower since the War" (10), Table 1; Harold Barger,
bution's Place in the American Economy Since 1869 (3), Table 1.
aGainful workers, aged ten and over, 1870—1930; labor force, aged four-
teen and over, 1940 and 1950.
bmi8figure is the number of gainful workers aged fourteen and over and
is, therefore, comparable with figures for 1940 and 1950.
CParenthetic figuresare adjusted for overestimate of public emergency
workers in construction in 1940 (see Appendix B for method of adjustment).
whichthe labor force in construction bears to total manpower. The tim-
ing of decades of rapid and slow growth corresponds perfectly with
earlier results for the decades of upswing and downswing in construc-
tion.
So far then as data of this type can, they uphold the conclusion
that aggregate construction activity did, indeed, move in long waves
during the period between 1870 and 1950. However, the evidence these
data afford is, in some ways, of limited significance. It points toward
long waves in construction activity, but it does not necessarily support
the view that long upswings in construction activity were followed by
long downswings in the absolute level of activity. The fluctuations in
the growth of the labor force in construction may mean no more than
that periods of rapid growth in the volume of construction were fol-
125Evidences of Long Swings in Aggregate Comstruction
lowed by periods of slower growth. The Census data reveal that long
waves in manpower growth were not peculiar to the construction in-
dustry. shows that fluctuations of the same type, and with
exactly similar timing, appear in the growth of the total labor force.
Such waves in labor-force growth appear to have been a prominent
feature of the general long swings in the United States economy re-
ferred to in Chapter 1. Although all major branches of the economy,
except agriculture, manufacturing and mining, and government, dis-
played fluctuations in manpower growth which were congruent with
those in construction to some degree, the long waves rose and fell with
regularity only in transportation, trade and finance, and professional
and personal service. In none of these branches, except transportation,
however, were the fluctuations in manpower growth so large as in con-
struction. Moreover, as Easterlin points out, there is a connection be-
tween the fluctuations in construction activity and those in the growth of
the transportation, trade, and service industries. The most violent long
waves in construction activity are those in transportation development
and in urban building. There is, therefore, a logical structural connec-
tion among these observations. Fluctuations in the growth of the labor
force in transportation and public utilities ought to be accompanied by
similar swings in the volume of railroad and public utility construction.
Similarly, fluctuations in the growth of peculiarly urban occupations
like trade, finance, and professional and personal service ought to be
accompanied by similar swings in the volume of urban building. So far
as manpower figures can indicate, it appears that they were.
4"Labor Force Trends and Projections" (15).
126

Evidences of Long Swings in Aggregate Construction Since the Civil War

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