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Here’s the non-fantasy story of how hotels are doing

Published on 11 Comments on Here’s the non-fantasy story of how hotels are doing

The good ol' Wall Street Journal reports today on the travails of the hotel industry:

Even after clawing back hundreds of thousands of jobs during the past two years, the industry is still light on staff and often struggling to adapt.... At the same time, hotels across the U.S. have held their daily room rates near all-time highs this winter, in part to offset the increase in wages to lure workers back. Hotels will collectively pay $123 billion in compensation this year, up more than 20% from 2019, according to the American Hotel & Lodging Association.

It's true that hotels are still light on staff: total employment is down about 10% compared to before the pandemic. But about that pay:

Hotel pay went up in 2021, but over the past two years it's been dead flat. In fact, actually down 21¢ an hour. This doesn't sound like a herculean effort to attract more staff.

In fairness, the room rates that the Journal reports as "near all-time highs" are—surprise!—lower than they were four years ago when you adjust for inflation.

You will always get a distorted view of industry dynamics if you don't account for inflation. So why do the Journal and other news outlets so resolutely refuse to do it? In this case, it's just not true that hotels are charging high room rates and paying sky high wages but still can't find enough workers. In fact, (a) hotel stays haven't grown since 2019, (b) hotels are having trouble keeping room rates from falling, and (c) as a result they've been reducing pay and deliberately cutting staff. Why not just report that?

11 thoughts on “Here’s the non-fantasy story of how hotels are doing”

  1. golack

    WSJ writes an article.
    Drum generates a chart to show that it is wrong.

    You're only one person--could you write a script to call up AI to do the "leg work" for you?

    😉

  2. rick_jones

    I am always impressed by Kevin’s belief that it is possible to train John and Joan Public to believe in something not being more expensive than before, because inflation adjustment…

  3. Altoid

    Can't let facts get in the way of a good story, eh? And this particular storyline makes me nostalgic for the old turnips about how earnest employers just can't find anybody to take the jobs they're offering, no matter how hard they try. Could WSJ be playing to the readership?

  4. Anandakos

    The Journal, Fux News, the Bannonistas and the rest of the Lyin Republicans love to blame rising prices on Democrats, so OF COURSE they don't adjust for inflation.

  7. kkseattle

    Room rates may be flat, but like shrinkflation, the service provided has collapsed.

    It’s extremely rare to get daily cleaning service any more, and many hotels have shut down room service or dining altogether.

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