Report shows how much the pandemic has hurt outdoor recreation economy in 2020; federal aid could help rebound

"Earnings from outdoor recreation stumbled a bit in 2020 due to the pandemic, but the sector remained an important part of the U.S. economy, according to a new interactive report from Headwaters Economics," Kristi Eaton reports for The Daily Yonder. "The gross domestic product from outdoor recreation fell 19 percent from 2019 to 2020, and employment dropped by about 17%, the report said. But the sector still accounted for $374 billion of gross domestic product last year. That’s more than twice the size of motor-vehicle manufacturing, fossil-fuel extraction, or air transportation."

Outdoor recreation tends to play a bigger role in rural areas, Headwaters economist Megan Lawson told Eaton. Rural states are "more likely to have the natural amenities like open spaces and public lands that can support outdoor recreation," she said, noting that outdoor recreation is often a big moneymaker in New England, the Mountain West, Florida and Hawaii.

The biggest challenges of 2021 for hospitality-industry businesses such as restaurants and hotels will likely be supply-chain disruptions and difficulty finding employees, Lawson said. But she said that increased federal funding through the infrastructure bill and the Great American Outdoors Act could help communities better deal with those issues and others.