Leisure/Hospitality Employment Still Only 4/5 What It Was Pre-Pandemic

By Hugh Jackson, Nevada Current

November 18, 2021

There were nearly 100,000 more jobs in Nevada last month than there were the previous October, but the workforce is still about 80,000 jobs shy of pre-pandemic levels, with jobs failing to return in the leisure and hospitality sector accounting for the shortfall, according to data announced by the Department of Employment, Training and Rehabilitation Thursday.

DETR’s October 2021 employment report puts the total workforce at 1,363,900.

The size of the state’s workforce peaked in February 2020 at 1,442,800.

The largest job growth over the last year was in the state’s largest pre-pandemic workforce sector, leisure and hospitality, with nearly 35,000 more jobs than in October 2020. That brought the total size of the workforce to 279,700. But that’s still roughly 77,000 jobs shy of the sector’s pre-pandemic total of 356,500.

Edging out leisure and hospitality as the state’s largest employment sector in October 2021 was trade, transportation and utilities, a sector that includes what has been one of Nevada’s and the nation’s most common occupations for decades, retail trade. The sector added 18,500 jobs over the prior 12 months, returning to a total workforce size of 283,000, same as on the eve of the pandemic in February 2020.

Professional and business services employment comprised the state’s third largest workforce in October, with 199,900 jobs, not far below the sector’s pre-pandemic level of 204, 600. While the sector includes higher quality jobs in company management or professional, scientific and technical services, the most common occupations are office administration and clerical work, security, and janitorial services.

Nevada has had the highest or nearly the highest unemployment rate throughout the pandemic, and that remained the case in October, with a state rate of 7.3%, a slight dip from the nation-leading rate of 7.5% recorded in September.

Nevada Current, a nonprofit, online source of political news and commentary, documents the policies, institutions and systems that affect Nevadans’ daily lives. The Current is part of States Newsroom, a national 501(c)(3) nonprofit supported by grants and a coalition of donors and readers.