Travel Employment Up in August

After falling in July, travel employment rose again in August, according to the U.S. Travel Association, which last week released an analysis of the U.S. Department of Labor’s August jobs report.

Overall, the Labor Department reported, unemployment in August held steady at 7.3 percent as the U.S. economy added 169,000 new jobs — 14,000 of which were in the travel industry, which currently boasts direct employment of 7.8 million.

“The travel industry continues to lead the way in our nation’s employment recovery … creating 9 percent of all of the private sector jobs added last month — equal to the number of jobs added by the entire manufacturing sector,” U.S. Travel Association Senior Vice President of Research and Economics David Huether said in a statement. “Travel employment has risen by 85,000 jobs so far this year. Bucking the overall trend in the rest of the economy, where job growth has been slower than in 2012, the travel industry added more jobs per month thus far in 2013 than in 2012.”

Huether attributes travel-industry gains largely to travel exports, which, he says, support more than a million jobs and have been growing six times faster than other exports of goods and services so far this year. “Being a labor-intensive industry, faster travel export growth from more international visitation to our country is translating into more American jobs,” he explained. “Since the economic recovery began in early 2010, the travel industry has created jobs at a 12 percent faster pace than the rest of the economy, and has already made up 91 percent of the jobs lost during the recession compared to just 78 percent of jobs for the rest of the economy, proving yet again that travel is a significant driver of our economy’s growth and a leader in America job creation.”