Prior to the 2024 Presidential election, we conducted our End-of-Q3 Civil Construction Market Confidence Poll. Let’s take a look at the results and compare them to the previous quarter and the poll we ran this time last year.
Watch: After Q2, What is Your Outlook on the Civil Construction Market?
Hi, I’m Taylor Maurer, Founder and Senior Managing Partner for Heavy Civil Resource Consultants.
We asked Civil Construction Professionals: After Q3, what is your outlook for the next four quarters in the civil construction market?
Here are the results:
- 22% felt that there would be strong growth
- 34% expected moderate growth
- 32% anticipated the market to stagnate
- 12% predicted the market would shrink
Now, let’s compare those results to the end of Second Quarter:
- 24% predicted strong growth after Q2, compared to 22% after Q3
- 42% predicted moderate growth last quarter, compared to 34% at the end of Q3
- 28% thought the market would stagnate after Q2, compared to 32% recently
- And only 6% thought the market would shrink after Q2, compared to 12% after Q3
Let’s compare the results from the end of Q3 last year:
- There was a drop of 2 percentage points from 24% in 2023 to 22% in 2024 for strong growth
- A 5-point reduction from 39% to 34% for moderate growth
- A 10-point increase in stagnation, the largest shift, from 22% to 32%
- A small reduction from 15% to 12% for the market shrinking
It is safe to say that our more recent poll showed an unfavorable shift in confidence in the civil construction market, with 56% expecting some sort of growth, compared to 66% expecting growth last year.
This poll was conducted a few weeks before the presidential election. In a recent poll asking construction professionals about their political orientation, 53% identified as Republicans, and 11% identified as Democrats.
Coupled with our recent poll results, which favored Donald Trump over Kamala Harris by more than three-to-one (74% to 24%) regarding who would invest more in infrastructure, we can expect a significant shift toward increased confidence in the civil construction market after Q1 (post-election results) and after Q2 (once Trump takes office).
Check out my post-election analysis video here to gain historical and analytical insight into how the second term of Donald Trump’s presidency might affect the infrastructure construction market.
Read also: What does Trump 2.0 mean for construction globally?
If you are looking to secure top construction or engineering talent in this very competitive market please book a call with me to discuss some strategies on how to make your company and offer of employment more attractive to passive candidates.
