WTTC: US Travel Industry Lost $766 Billion in 2020

According to the Economic Impact Report (EIR) submitted by the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC), the US travel industry lost $766 billion in 2020. This represents the effect of the travel and tourism’s GDP loss plus other direct, indirect, and induced impacts.

The US travel and tourism sector’s performance in 2019 amassed a GDP of almost $1.9 trillion. WTTC discovered that the sector’s GDP contribution dropped by 41% in 2020 because of the pandemic. The US has the largest travel and tourism economy in the world. And according to the WTTC, the US will also play a role in the rebound of the sector on a global scale.

The travel and tourism sector in the US supported more than 16.5 million jobs in 2019. By 2020, the number declined by 33.2 percent to 11.1 million. Worldwide, the sector lost 62 million jobs in 2020.

International And Domestic Travel

Domestic and international travel can help in the recovery of the entire sector. With travel restrictions, the lack of traveler spending was felt by small and medium-sized businesses making up 80% of all travel and tourism-related businesses.

The Biden administration has done its part in keeping the travel industry afloat. The airline industry received $14 billion thanks to the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021. Plus, with the progress being made in the vaccine rollout, more people are now traveling domestic.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is also a factor how people travel in the new normal. For instance, though many are booking flights, the cruise industry still hasn’t restarted because of the health agency’s conditional sailing order. Plus, the US expanded its Level 4: No Travel guidance list to 80% of the world’s countries.

Reopening the travel and tourism sector is a challenging task.  There is the challenge of preventing another surge in the number of COVID cases while attempting to achieve herd immunity using vaccines. Given the need to balance the economy and public health, the travel industry can expect months or even years before everything goes back to normal.