Earnings from outdoor recreation stumbled a bit in 2020 because of the pandemic, but the sector remained an important part of the U.S. economy, according to a new interactive report from Headwaters Economics.
“They can’t hire employees to staff the restaurants, to guide their rafts, to teach ski lessons,” she said, “because those folks can’t afford to live in these places.
Montana lost over 1.6 million acres of farmland between 20212 and 2017.
“I think that shines a light on the economic opportunity that outdoor recreation presents for communities, that even in a pandemic, it still has the power to bring visitors in and bring that spending in,” Lawson said.
Some of Lawson’s more recent research shows more people moving to counties with lots of recreational opportunities and those newcomers tend to have higher incomes than people moving to cities. And those new residents appear more ready to direct tax dollars toward conservation.
Three Forks has developed a plan for mitigating flood risk, but failed to receive federal funding when it applied earlier this year. However, under the trillion-dollar infrastructure bill passed in Congress last week, FEMA’s program for reducing flood damage has seen its budget more than triple to $700 million annually.
“Now, with this bill, they are likely to get that money,” Ms. Hernandez said. “And their flood risk reduction project will also help the region’s housing affordability and economy.”
“The scale of the transition, from a fiscal point of view, is beyond what any one community or county can handle,” Smith said. “There is not a single industry — sports and events or otherwise — that will be able to generate revenue like coal has for Campbell County.”
“A lot of times the folks who own these places are able to bid up the prices and pay a little more for those houses knowing that they can recoup some of that price premium by renting the house out,” says Megan Lawson, an economist with the nonprofit Headwaters Economics.
A report from Headwaters Economics shows that the cost of building a fireproof structure from the ground up doesn’t differ significantly from the cost of building any other home from scratch.
A new report from Headwaters Economics shows that 20 rural counties across Kansas are now considered unaffordable for renters.
“What was very apparent to us is that these unprecedented price increases that we’ve been seeing lots of anecdotes about aren’t isolated,” said Headwaters Economics researcher Megan Lawson. “It’s incredibly widespread.”
“The housing bubble pales in comparison to the price increases we are seeing now. Hopefully, it slows down,” said Megan Lawson, an economist with Headwaters who conducted the study.
Costs in lesser known areas in practically every corner of Utah are also ballooning — even in off-the-beaten-path or rural communities that were previously considered more affordable.
That’s according to new data released last month by the nonprofit Headwaters Economics, which highlight skyrocketing housing costs throughout the United States.
A new analysis from Headwaters Economics paints a picture of soaring housing costs across the West and beyond.
“Communities are seeing outdoor recreation as a way to even out the booms and busts of those extractive industries . . . as they respond to big macroeconomic fluctuations,” Lawson continued. “That’s something that I’ve really seen change.”
Still, recreation economies are no silver bullet. For one, Lawson said, counties with developed recreation economies have lower wages and higher housing costs on average. But wages are growing at a faster rate than those in counties without recreation, according to Headwaters Economics data.
The oil and gas industries also made up the lion’s share of revenue in previous years, according to a recent report issued by Headwaters Economics, a Montana-based group.
The report recommended four different activities to diversify revenue generated on New Mexico state trust land – renewable energy, commercial development, outdoor recreation and conservation.
The Oregon Home Builders Association testified the measures would add substantial cost to a home’s price, even though other assessments found fire-resistant homes would be minimally higher or even cheaper. The state did approve fire mitigation codes in 2019 but left them optional.
From 2005 to 2020, nearly 60,000 structures were destroyed by wildfires in California — comprising 67% of the 89,210 structures to burn in the entire U.S. during that time, according to Headwaters Economics.
Headwaters Associate Director Kelly Pohl says those factors can add to the impact of wildfires, which are becoming more severe and frequent due to climate change.
“Wildfire smoke and environmental stress can exacerbate existing medical conditions, which are more common among the elderly, the disabled and people living in poverty,” Pohl said.
