Work at home effects on businesses near former workplaces

My wife had a restaurant 

near Chrysler headquarters

and product development,

from 1978 to 1992.

Chrysler employees

were her primary 

customers.

Working at home was

not possible at the time,

but if it was, Chrysler

employees working from 

home would have shut

down her business.

Unemployment is finally
declining but is still huge.
The BLS chooses to ignore
the unemployed people
receiving federal benefits
(red) with their own 
unemployment numbers
(in blue):

Foot traffic to 

“Places of Commerce,” 

have been hit hard 

by work at home rules.

AEI released a weekly 

Foot Traffic Index 

for 40 metro areas 

in the US, based  on 

cellphone GPS data 

from Safegraph.com.

The seven-day moving 

average tracks daily visits 

to “points of interest,” 

such as stores, malls, 

restaurants, hotels, 

movie theaters, airports, 

hospitals, other places

of commerce, and visits

from employees.

Each line in the chart below

represents one of the 

40 metros. 

It compares foot traffic 

in the current week 

to where foot traffic was 

in the week ended January 15. 

100% would mean foot traffic 

is back at its January 2020 level.

Some of the 40 metro areas 

are shown  below 

( comparing foot-traffic 

percentages in the week 

ended August 9, and the 

foot traffic percentages 

during the low point

for that metro area ):

Metro    Week 

 Area    to Aug 9.    Trough

Atlanta, GA    67%   34%

St. Louis, MO   66%    35%

Detroit, MI   65%   25%

Chicago , IL   64%  30%

Minneapolis   63%   30%

Dallas, TX    62%   33%

San Diego, CA    59%    27%

Baltimore, MD     57%    32%

Portland, OR     56%    34%

Philadelphia, PA   56%   29%

Seattle, WA    55%   32%

Boston, MA    54%    25%

Washington, DC    53%   29%

Las Vegas, NV   53% 22%

New York, NY   53%  24%

Los Angeles, CA   47% 26%

Miami, FL       47%   26%

San Francisco, CA 43%    25%

San Jose, C      42%    25%

Working-from-home numbers

can be tracked by collecting 

data from access control systems, 

such as keycards, key fobs, 

and access apps. 

Kastle Systems provides access 

systems for 3,600 buildings and 

41,000 businesses in 47 states.

They have been  releasing 

a weekly Back to Work Barometer, 

based on the data from its access 

systems in 10 large metro areas.

Office occupancy collapsed

in March and April, to around 

15% of normal. as measured 

by employees entering the office.

A mild recovery stalled in mid-June. 

The average is now 22.6%.

The New York metro area

was the lowest at 11.7%.

San Francisco was 13%. 

Foot traffic into 

the security zones

of airports – 

the TSA’s 

daily checkpoint 

screenings --

are is still down 

about 70% 

from a year ago.

Tourists from overseas

are not coming to the US.

Google moved its 

return-to-the-office-date 

to at least July 2021. 

Restaurants are usually open

for outdoor dining, take-out, 

or delivery, but business 

is slow.

Fitness centers 

and pools

are closed.

Many small businesses 

are in big trouble.