DENVER — A new study by Construction Coverage, a construction research company, found immigrants make up nearly a third of Denver’s construction workforce.
The study analyzed data from the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2023 American Community Survey 5-year estimate.
The study found across the U.S., the construction industry employs about 2.9 million immigrants, or 26% of the construction workforce, making Denver's immigrant construction workforce figures higher than that of the country as a whole, at 27.7%.
The study also found three occupation groups where foreign-born workers make up a majority of the workforce: Drywall and ceiling installers (56.9%), painters and paperhangers (50.2%), and roofers (50.0%).
“Immigrants tend to occupy jobs that U.S. born citizens don't want to do because the working conditions are hard or the wages are low, and those are very unpleasant jobs. So, construction is one of them, meat packing industry, slaughterhouse, any farm work,” Alexandre Padilla, Metropolitan State University of Denver Economics Chair, told Denver7 Wednesday. “So, the issue is from an economic viewpoint, right? I'm not going to talk about morality... but the more from an economic viewpoint, that the only way to continue to operate will be to either automatize, right? Automatization of industry, or pay workers more money to attract workers.”
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But Padilla said higher wages means higher prices.
“You have to find a way to stay profitable, and therefore you are likely going to transfer that rising cost toward consumers,” Padilla said.
The study warned that as federal immigration enforcement increases, the construction industry will start to feel the strain.
“We have this very complex situation where we have so many consequences based on two — I don't want to oversimplify — but two policies that have a broad goal: To reduce immigration significantly; the argument is we need to give the job to American workers. And to reduce significantly imports of goods, particularly factors of production, what we call resources, materials that are necessary to build housing, for example, and other things. As a result, that leads to a huge increase in housing cost,” Padilla said.
The study included a summary of the data for Denver-Aurora-Lakewood, CO:
- Percentage of construction employees who are foreign-born: 27.7%
- Total construction employees who are foreign-born: 35,597
- Total construction industry employment: 128,696
- Percentage of all workers who are foreign-born: 15.9%
For reference, the study cited these statistics for the entire United States:
- Percentage of construction employees who are foreign-born: 26.0%
- Total construction employees who are foreign-born: 2,879,267
- Total construction industry employment: 11,070,540
- Percentage of all workers who are foreign-born: 18.7%
