The outdoor recreation sector is huge, contributing about $454 billion to US GDP, according to the US Bureau of Economic Analysis. The bipartisan research group Headwaters Economics recently unpacked this federal data, and the analysis shows where in the West these effects are most pronounced.
This figure of nearly half a trillion dollars is from 2021, the latest full year data available. Outdoor recreation accounted for almost 2% of the US economy — more than double that of auto manufacturing — and accounted for about 4.5 million jobs.
In many western states, the impact was much greater. In Montana and Wyoming, the recovery accounted for 4.4% and 3.6% of the state economies, respectively. Idaho, Utah and Colorado also had numbers well above the country as a whole. But like many areas of the economy, pandemic shutdowns are hitting the recovery hard.
“I think the economy, at least the outdoor recreation economy, has really recovered from that,” said Megan Lawson, a Headwaters economist who authored the analysis.
The analysis shows that the economic impact of the sector increased by more than 20% from 2020 to 2021 and employment increased by about 13%.
“The outdoor recreation economy is big and growing,” Lawson said. “And I think an important aspect of the history of the outdoor leisure economy is that it’s not just about tourism and it’s not just about hospitality and retail. Outdoor recreation supports many different sectors of our economy – it supports manufacturing and warehousing and wholesale, real estate, healthcare and (and) construction.”
She also noted that there is evidence that the cabin fever-triggered surge in interest in outdoor recreation seen at the beginning of the pandemic does not appear to be abating.
“The number of people that are going outside, the number of trips that people are taking is similar to these … early pandemic numbers,” she said. “And so I would agree that there has been something of a reset. People have either rediscovered or discovered for the first time the mental health and physical health benefits of getting outside.”
This story was produced by Mountain West News Bureau, a collaboration between Wyoming Public Media, Nevada Public Radio, Boise State Public Radio in Idaho, KUNR in Nevada, the O’Connor Center for the Rocky Mountain West in Montana, KUNC in Colorado, KUNM in New Mexico, with support from affiliated stations throughout the region. The Mountain West News Bureau is funded in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
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