Document Type
Report
Publication Date
2-4-2021
Publisher
Brookings Mountain West
Publisher Location
Las Vegas (Nev.)
First page number:
1
Last page number:
18
Abstract
As the United States prepares for a COVID-19 recovery, policymakers need to understand why some cities and communities were more vulnerable to the pandemic’s economic consequences than others. In this paper, we consider the association between a city’s core industry, its economic susceptibility to the pandemic, and the recession’s racially disparate impact across six select metropolitan areas. We find that areas with economies that rely on the movement of people—like Las Vegas with tourism—faced substantially higher unemployment at the end of 2020 than cities with core industries based on the movement of information. Further, we find the hardest-hit areas have larger Hispanic or Latino communities, reflecting both the demographic composition of workers in heavily impacted industries, and the geography of urban areas their core industries. We conclude by recommending targeted federal policy to address the regions and communities most impacted by the COVID-19 recession.
Keywords
Las Vegas; Core Industries; Hispanic Workforce; COVID-19; Unemployment
Disciplines
Economic Policy | Hospitality Administration and Management | Public Policy | Race and Ethnicity
File Format
File Size
2470 KB
Language
English
Rights
IN COPYRIGHT. For more information about this rights statement, please visit http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
Repository Citation
Klein, A.,
Smith, E.
(2021).
Explaining the Economic Impact of COVID-19: Core Industries and the Hispanic Workforce.
1-18.
Available at:
https://digitalscholarship.unlv.edu/brookings_policybriefs_reports/2
Included in
Economic Policy Commons, Hospitality Administration and Management Commons, Public Policy Commons, Race and Ethnicity Commons