COVID-19 and Employment Decentralization in Miami

Keywords: COVID-19, Employment Decentralization, Miami
Session Type: Virtual Poster Abstract
Day: Monday
Session Start / End Time: 2/28/2022 11:20 AM (Eastern Time (US & Canada)) - 2/28/2022 12:40 PM (Eastern Time (US & Canada))
Room: Virtual 45

Abstract

American cities have been undergoing continuous employment decentralization for decades. Will COVID-19 alter this ongoing urban transformation? This project aims to answer the question by analyzing COVID-19’s impacts on employment distribution in Miami-Dade County (MDC) during the pandemic based on the businesses openings and disclosures. The preliminary analysis finds that the MDC lost more than 7,000 businesses from March 2020 to August 2021. Business losses are more concentrated in Miami’s minority-dominated neighborhoods, which means non-Cuban Hispanic and African American neighborhoods. For example, Doral, the largest Venezuelan community in the United States, lost 1,338 businesses. Spatially speaking, the pandemic has accelerated the city’s employment decentralization, particularly the low-end services businesses, such as retail sales, catering businesses, hotels etc. Regarding the high-end services, for example, professional services, a re-centralization pattern has been discovered. As high-end services have been closed in the suburb centers such as Coral Gables, Coconut Grove, and Dadeland, most business openings are incredibly concentrated in Brickell. Job opening data from September 2021’s Indeed.com also support this conclusion. Further investigation will be built based on the spatial logistic regression that compares survival businesses and closed businesses to explore if the business located in the zip code with more COVID-19 cases and higher cases per capita is more likely to be closed during the pandemic.