MAMMOTH HOT SPRINGS, WY – A new National Park Service (NPS) report shows that 4.9 million visitors to Yellowstone National Park in 2021 spent over $630 in communities near the park. That spending supported 8,736 jobs in the local area and had a cumulative benefit to the local economy of $834 million.
The peer-reviewed visitor spending analysis was conducted by economists at the National Park Service and the U.S. Geological Survey. The report shows $20.5 billion of direct spending by more than 297 million park visitors in communities within 60 miles of a national park. This spending supported 322,600 jobs nationally; 269,900 of those jobs are found in these gateway communities. The cumulative benefit to the U.S. economy was $42.5 billion.
As for the economics of visitor spending, the lodging sector had the highest direct effects, with $7 billion in economic output nationally. The restaurant sector had the second greatest effect, with $4.2 billion in economic output nationally.
