Construction salaryguy here. In the last few years construction material prices have gone up quite a bit. Some line items tripled or quadrupled. Let's call it overall cost of construction went up 40% per square feet. The general contractor marks the whole thing up the same flat rate of x% and calls it overhead & profit. Common practice. Overhead is to pay the office staff and keep the lights on basically. The overhead & profit budget expanded by the same 40% or whatever it was the overall increase in construction costs. Overhead, which is mostly made up of staff salaries did not go up 40%. Staff got 8% inflation adjustment. The balance goes to profit. Net profit margin goes up. Net profit amount goes up.
Don't take my word for it, open up your favorite construction cost index and see for yourself the breakdown of material cost increase vs. installation (labor) cost increase in all of the trades.
Fortunes are being made by playing the gap between material vs. labor cost increases. I'm not even gonna go in PPP loans that have been forgiven (shoved up a certain orifice in the posterior region of the taxpayes).
Have a nice day.