The coronavirus shatters the tourism economy

The big picture: A robust era for U.S. tourism has come to a previously unthinkable halt in just weeks. No one knows how long the upheaval will last, but economists expect tourism will look different once the country fully emerges from lockdown.

“I’m only really booking now for very advanced bookings,” for late this year and next year, Bruce Fisher, who’s owned travel agency Hawaii Aloha Travel for 20 years, tells Axios.

The unemployment rate in Hawaii has been lower than the national average in recent years. But Peter Fuleky, a professor at the University of Hawaii Economic Research Organization, projects the job picture will suffer in the state long after the rest of the U.S. economy recovers.

Already one third of the workforce there has applied for jobless aid since the shutdown, among the worst in the nation.