Study: Tourism was the Employment Driver in 2020; Las Vegas and Orlando Top Metros

A new report by Self Financial analyzing the U.S. states and metropolitan areas that have seen the largest year-over-year percentage increase in employment this year indicates the “COVID-19 recession” lasted two months, making it the shortest downturn on record, but it was also one of the deepest. 

In just two months, the unemployment rate rose from 3.5 percent to 14.8 percent, and total employment dropped from 152 million to 130 million (or approximately 14.5 percent). Today, less than two years after the start of the pandemic, total employment is just 2.8 percent below the pre-pandemic peak. 

Researchers ranked states and metros according to the percentage change in employment from October 2020 to October 2021.

Here are some key takeaways from the analysis:

• Locations highly dependent on tourism experienced the most job gains in the past year
• Among large metros, Las Vegas-Henderson-Paradise, NV saw the largest percentage increase in employment (+8.5 percent), followed by Orlando-Kissimmee-Sanford, FL (+6.7 percent) and Austin-Round Rock-Georgetown, TX (+6.7 percent)
• At the state level, Hawaii (+10.5 percent) and Nevada (+7.6 percent) led the way

On a regional level, the West Coast experienced the largest employment gains over the past year. 

Hawaii, whose tourism-dependent economy was disproportionately hurt by the pandemic, leads the country in job gains from October 2020 to October 2021 with a 10.5 percent increase in nonfarm employment. However, total nonfarm employment in the state is still 12.9 percent below pre-pandemic levels. Similarly, Nevada—which is also highly dependent on tourism—increased its employment by 7.6 percent from a year ago and remains about 5.5 percent below its pre-pandemic peak.

To find the metropolitan areas with the most job gains in 2021, researchers at Self Financial analyzed the latest employment data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The researchers ranked metro areas according to the percentage change in employment from October 2020 to October 2021. 

Researchers also included the total change in employment, total employment, and the unemployment rate. To improve relevance, only metropolitan areas with at least 100,000 people were included in the analysis.

Here are the large U.S. metros with the most job gains in 2021.

Read the study by Self Financial here.