Leisure and Hospitality Trends in the SETTRA Region

We at Dean Runyan Associates thought it would be interesting to look at Leisure and Hospitality (L&H) employment, average hours worked, and average wage data in the 12 SETTRA states for the first half of 2021 and compare them to the same six months in 2020 and 2019. It turns out we were right, as the numbers portray a few noteworthy trends.

 First and foremost, 2021 has been a year of growth for the SETTRA region as a whole as well as for most of its member states. For year-to-date June in the 12 states combined, L&H employment grew 1.8% year over year, average weekly hours grew by 2.8%, and average wages increased an impressive 5.2%. Another good sign for the tourism industry was that L&H growth outpaced growth for Total Non-Farm employment in all three metrics.

 As expected, however, the comparisons to 2019 were not quite as positive. While average L&H wages were up an impressive 7.7% between Jan-Jun 2019 and Jan-Jun 2021, average hours worked were flat (-0.4%), and total L&H employment was down 16.1%. The changes in hours worked and average wages were on par with all private industries, but overall L&H employment still has some catching up to do as the two-year decline in non-farm employment was a relatively modest -3.5%.

Although the first six months of 2021 was quite good for the L&H sector among SETTRA’s member states, performance across the three measures varied considerably. Year over year growth in employment was strong in West Virginia, +8.1%, but ranged into the negative with a 2.1% decline in Florida. Florida led all states in terms of average hours worked, however, +6.8%, while five states had growth of under 2% including South Carolina’s decline of 0.3%. Average wage growth was positive in all states but ranged from Maryland’s 1.9% increase to South Carolina’s 8.0% gain. Also, while L&H employment has not recovered to 2019 levels in any of the 12 states, the average number of hours worked has increased in seven, and average wages are up in all. 

 And how did the SETTRA region perform compared to TTRA’s other U.S. regions? In terms of two-year L&H employment growth, SETTRA outperformed all other chapters- despite the 16.1% decline cited above.