Michigan’s Annual Tourism Conference announces impressive tourism numbers
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EmailThe Pure Michigan Governor’s Conference on Tourism hosted its annual conference and reported “214,333 jobs are directly supported by visitors to Michigan,” and has outpaced all other industries in Michigan for job growth.
When talking to Michigan residents about how important the tourism industry is for the state, people tend to nod their heads and agree. However, usually people are not really aware of the significance tourism holds for the Great Lakes State unless they read up on the numbers shared annually. Most residents, however, will know though that the automobile industry is a significant employer, but still many will not know exactly how the two compare to another or other states. You can learn more about tourism by visiting the Michigan State University Extension website.
The auto-manufacturing sector of Michigan supports over a half-million jobs; 532,000 to be exact, according to recent reports on MLive.com and said to be largest in the country (Ohio is second and Indiana is third.) While Ohio and Indiana have between 500-600 auto-manufacturing establishments, Michigan has close to a thousand, and that is impressive!
While tourism may not just one single industry, like the automobile industry which employs nearly a half-million people, it is important for Michigan and should not be overlooked. Just this week, the Pure Michigan Governor’s Conference on Tourism hosted its annual conference and reported “214,333 jobs are directly supported by visitors to Michigan,” and has outpaced all other industries in Michigan for job growth. Now that is impressive as well!
According to Dave West, Director of Travel Michigan, “Tourism-related job growth outpaced overall state employment growth by more than 0.5 percent in 2014 and outpaced state economic growth for four consecutive years.” West continued to share successes on Michigan’s growth by announcing that in 2014 113.4 million people visited Michigan, which contributed to tourism generating $2.4 billion in state and local taxes and $2.5 billion in federal taxes. Additional staggering figures were highlighted in the Holland Sentinel shortly after the annual Conference wrapped up.
One interesting figure that puts the importance of Michigan tourism for the state into perspective is that if tourism were indeed one single industry it would rest at 132 on the Fortune 500!
Now that is very impressive!
