New York-area employment dropped 13.6 percent between July 2019 and July 2020, with the hospitality industry taking a particularly large hit, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Wednesday.
The statistical area that includes New York City and parts of New Jersey and Pennsylvania lost 1.3 million jobs over the year, the bureau said. The 13.6 percent drop in employment in a region where much of the economy shut down to curb the spread of the coronavirus was much larger than the 7.7% drop in jobs nationally during the same period.
The leisure and hospitality industries in the region lost 439,800 jobs from July 2019 to July 2020, the largest number of any industry, the bureau reported. In percentage terms, the leisure and hospitality sector declined 43.9 percent over the year in the New York metropolitan area, compared to 24.2 percent nationally.
The bureau’s New York-New Jersey statistical area includes New York City and several surrounding counties in New York and New Jersey plus Pike County in Pennsylvania.
