Hasta La Ideas

While the ups and downs continue unabated, it’s always nice to end a particularly rocky year on a positive note. The American Institute of Architects have released their latest Architecture Billings Index. Following last month’s welcomed-yet-slight uptick to 49.4, this time things shot all the way up to 52.0 (anything above 50 indicates an increase in billings and gives a more general sense of where things are at in the architecture and construction businesses). Despite the good news, the AIA’s main man of math was his usual cautious self, though it’s fun to imagine that he said the following while wearing a Santa hat and a thick egg nog mustache:

“This is a heartening development for the design and construction industry that only a few years ago accounted for nearly ten percent of overall GDP but has fallen to slightly less than six percent,” said AIA Chief Economist, Kermit Baker, PhD, Hon. AIA. “Hopefully, this uptick in billings is a sign that a recovery phase is in the works. However, given the volatility that we’ve seen nationally and internationally recently, we’ll need to see several more months of positive readings before we’ll have much confidence that the U.S. construction recession is ending.”

And with that, this writer’s week has come to an end. Hope there’s happy holidays to all our readers near and far.

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