The U.S. construction and mining equipment industry is comprised
of hundreds of firms, from small businesses to some of the
world’s largest multinational corporations. Construction
equipment is used for the construction of residential and
nonresidential buildings, for surface and strip mining
operations, for new power and manufacturing plants, for logging
operations and for adding to or renovating infrastructure, such
as sewage and water lines, roads, bridges and tunnels. Mining
equipment firms produce machinery used in underground mining and
minerals processing operations. Machines built by the
construction equipment industry are usually classified into ten
types: backhoes; bulldozers; construction and surface mining
rock drill bits; construction tractors and attachments; off-
highway trucks; pile-driving equipment; portable crushing,
pulverizing, and screening machinery; powered post hole digging
machinery; motor graders and paving machinery; and surface
mining machinery. Machines built by the mining equipme