Construction has a racism problem.
So far in 2020, nearly 20 reported incidents of flagrant racism took place on construction jobsites throughout North America, from nooses hung where workers of color would find them, to racist screeds of graffiti spewing hate.
But as this series has shown, these latest episodes are nothing new in construction, where racism has been tolerated on jobsites for decades. It also runs in a subtle undercurrent of systemic discrimination and an ingrained hierarchy that reinforces the status quo in a $1.3 trillion industry.
