Data from the US Census Bureau showed Thursday that construction spending during January 2012 was at an approximate annual rate of US$827 billion, down 0.1 percent from December 2011 spending of US$827.6 billion. However, the January figure is 7.1 percent above the January 2011 annual rate of US$772 billion.
Spending on private construction held steady during January while public construction had a slight decrease from December. Private construction spending was at an annual rate of US$538.7 billion, nearly the same as the December level, while the annual rate of public construction spending was US$288.3 billion--0.9 percent below spending in December.