An official website of the United States government
Hurricane Katrina struck the Louisiana coast on August 29 and resulted in a tragic loss of life and significant disruptions of local economies in three States. On September 24, less than a month later, Hurricane Rita landed on the border between Texas and Louisiana. The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) produces a wide range of labor market data that may be used in evaluation of the scale of the storms' economic disruption. The facts and figures here are meant to establish conditions in the most affected local labor markets as they were before the hurricanes struck and do not reflect any impacts from the hurricanes. The two events are being considered together because they were closely linked in time, affected geographically contiguous areas, and had a cumulative economic impact.
As the analyses on this page are based on August 2005 data for regions, States, and metropolitan areas, they do not reflect the impacts of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. For information on how Hurricane Katrina affected BLS data collection and estimation processes, see Effects of Hurricane Katrina on BLS Employment and Unemployment Data Collection and Estimation. For information on post-hurricane employment and unemployment in the areas affected by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, see Labor Market Statistics for Areas Affected by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita: September and October 2005.
Please note: (1) An earlier version of this webpage with Katrina-only data is available at https://www.bls.gov/katrina/data_archived.htm. (2) The analysis of statistics from the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (QCEW) on this page was performed with preliminary 2004 data. After the analysis was completed and posted, revised 2004 data were released; revised QCEW data for 2004 for the U.S., States, metropolitan areas, and counties can be accessed using these data tools: https://data.bls.gov/PDQWeb/en (requires JavaScript-enabled browser) or https://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/dsrv?en.
One labor market baseline is the number of business establishments, their total employment, and the wages they paid to their workers in 2004, the most recent year for which the Bureau of Labor Statistics has complete data.
"Most-affected" areas in State | Establishments | ||
---|---|---|---|
Number | As a percentage of state total | As a percentage of US total | |
Alabama |
20,787 | 18.2% | 0.2% |
Louisiana |
85,034 | 73.2% | 1.0% |
Mississippi |
41,941 | 63.3% | 0.5% |
Texas |
15,480 | 3.0% | 0.2% |
TOTAL |
163,242 | 1.9% | |
"Most-affected" areas in State | Employment | ||
Number | As a percentage of state total | As a percentage of US total | |
Alabama |
323,788 | 17.5% | 0.3% |
Louisiana |
1,408,529 | 75.5% | 1.1% |
Mississippi |
729,466 | 66.0% | 0.6% |
Texas |
276,891 | 3.0% | 0.2% |
TOTAL |
2,738,674 | 2.1% | |
"Most-affected" areas in State | Wages | ||
Dollars | As a percentage of state total | As a percentage of US total | |
Alabama |
10,041,866,263 | 16.2% | 0.2% |
Louisiana |
46,385,949,440 | 78.1% | 0.9% |
Mississippi |
21,287,302,242 | 67.5% | 0.4% |
Texas |
9,357,161,386 | 2.6% | 0.2% |
TOTAL |
87,072,279,331 | 1.7% | |
Note: These data represent the 10 counties in Alabama, 34 parishes in Louisiana, 47 counties in Mississippi, and 9 counties in Texas that were designated by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) for both individual and public disaster assistance as of September 30, 2005. |
Source: Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages
Ownership and industry | Establishments | |
---|---|---|
Number | As a percentage of US total | |
TOTAL |
163,242 | 1.9% |
Private, Total |
155,777 | 1.9% |
Natural Resources and Mining |
3,844 | 3.1% |
Construction |
14,367 | 1.8% |
Manufacturing |
6,444 | 1.7% |
Trade, Transportation, and Utilities |
42,203 | 2.3% |
Information |
2,343 | 1.6% |
Financial Activities |
17,543 | 2.2% |
Professional and Business Services |
23,956 | 1.8% |
Education and Health Services |
15,416 | 2.1% |
Leisure and Hospitality |
13,774 | 2.0% |
Other Services |
15,157 | 1.4% |
Unclassified |
843 | 0.5% |
Federal Government, Total |
1,539 | 3.0% |
State Government, Total |
1,928 | 3.0% |
Local Government, Total |
4,011 | 2.6% |
Note: These data represent the 10 counties in Alabama, 34 parishes in Louisiana, 47 counties in Mississippi, and 9 counties in Texas that were designated by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) for both individual and public disaster assistance as of September 30, 2005. |
As shown in the table 1, there were roughly 163,000 establishments in the areas most affected by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita — those requiring Federal relief to individuals as well as to State and local governments and certain nonprofit organizations. These establishments employed some 2.7 million workers and paid them approximately $87 billion in wages in the fourth quarter of 2004. These areas accounted for 1.9 percent of all establishments in the United States and for substantially larger shares of the national total of establishments in the natural resources and mining (3.1 percent) industry and Federal and State government (3.0 percent each). (See table 2.)
All affected areas in State | Establishments | ||
---|---|---|---|
Number | As a percentage of state total | As a percentage of US total | |
Alabama |
47,700 | 41.7% | 0.6% |
Florida |
177,249 | 33.8% | 2.1% |
Louisiana |
116,096 | 100.0% | 1.4% |
Mississippi |
66,237 | 100.0% | 0.8% |
Texas |
512,574 | 100.0% | 6.1% |
TOTAL |
919,856 | 11.0% | |
All affected areas in State | Employment | ||
Number | As a percentage of state total | As a percentage of US total | |
Alabama |
819,901 | 44.3% | 0.6% |
Florida |
2,154,906 | 28.9% | 1.7% |
Louisiana |
1,866,499 | 100.0% | 1.4% |
Mississippi |
1,105,763 | 100.0% | 0.9% |
Texas |
9,322,008 | 100.0% | 7.2% |
TOTAL |
15,269,077 | 11.8% | |
All affected areas in State | Wages | ||
Dollars | As a percentage of state total | As a percentage of US total | |
Alabama |
28,292,015,615 | 45.7% | 0.6% |
Florida |
79,439,521,724 | 30.3% | 1.6% |
Louisiana |
59,424,097,229 | 100.0% | 1.2% |
Mississippi |
31,548,214,635 | 100.0% | 0.6% |
Texas |
359,091,992,699 | 100.0% | 7.1% |
TOTAL |
557,795,841,902 | 11.0% | |
Note: These data represent the 22 counties in Alabama, 11 counties in Florida, 64 parishes in Louisiana, 82 counties in Mississippi, and 254 counties in Texas that were designated by FEMA to receive any form of federal disaster assistance (individual or public assistance or both) as of September 30, 2005. |
Source: Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages
The areas that were designated to receive any form of federal disaster assistance had a total of about 15.3 million jobs in more than 900,000 establishments. (See table 3.) Employment in natural resources and mining in all the affected areas of Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas accounted for 18.9 percent of the industry's national total. (See table 4. Note that all the counties in Texas were designated as impacted by Hurricane Rita.)
Ownership and industry | Establishments | Employment | Wages | |||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Number | As a percentage of US total | Number | As a percentage of US total | Dollars | As a percentage of US total | |
TOTAL |
919,856 | 11.0% | 15,269,077 | 11.8% | 557,795,841,902 | 11.0% |
Private, Total |
891,765 | 11.0% | 12,576,280 | 11.6% | 461,560,364,321 | 10.9% |
Natural Resources and Mining |
22,851 | 18.6% | 317,674 | 18.9% | 18,864,362,516 | 31.2% |
Construction |
77,563 | 9.5% | 890,963 | 12.9% | 33,001,017,934 | 11.8% |
Manufacturing |
38,425 | 10.4% | 1,418,918 | 10.0% | 66,999,052,681 | 9.8% |
Trade, Transportation, and Utilities |
228,773 | 12.3% | 3,185,702 | 12.6% | 109,161,921,802 | 12.6% |
Information |
16,102 | 11.3% | D | D | ||
Financial Activities |
98,097 | 12.5% | 936,092 | 11.9% | 45,618,386,981 | 9.4% |
Professional and Business Services |
151,447 | 11.3% | 1,736,458 | 10.7% | 73,937,268,819 | 9.6% |
Education and Health Services |
87,873 | 11.8% | 1,745,730 | 10.9% | 60,061,254,172 | 10.2% |
Leisure and Hospitality |
73,243 | 10.8% | 1,530,850 | 12.3% | 24,097,275,724 | 11.6% |
Other Services |
87,090 | 8.1% | D | D | ||
Unclassified |
10,341 | 6.0% | 20,175 | 7.8% | 704,593,399 | 7.4% |
Federal Government, Total |
5,834 | 11.2% | 302,803 | 11.1% | 16,563,976,222 | 10.5% |
State Government, Total |
6,828 | 10.6% | 568,438 | 12.7% | 20,052,123,962 | 10.9% |
Local Government, Total |
15,435 | 10.0% | 1,821,560 | 13.4% | 59,619,377,397 | 11.9% |
D = Data do not meet BLS disclosure standards. Note: These data represent the 22 counties in Alabama, 11 counties in Florida, 64 parishes in Louisiana, 82 counties in Mississippi, and 254 counties in Texas that were designated by FEMA to receive any form of federal disaster assistance (individual or public assistance or both) as of September 30, 2005. |
Individual county and State annual average establishment, employment, and wage data by industry for 2004 are available from the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages program:
Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, Texas (Zipped XLS spreadsheet files).
In August 2005, the areas most affected by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita had a labor force of about 3.3 million workers, of whom 194,000 were unemployed. The unemployment rate for these combined areas was 6.0 percent, 1.1 percentage point higher than the rate for the U.S. as a whole. (Data are not seasonally adjusted.)
State or area | Labor force | Employment | Unemployment level | Unemployment rate |
---|---|---|---|---|
Entire State | ||||
Alabama |
2,155,745 | 2,065,528 | 90,217 | 4.2 |
Florida |
8,760,678 | 8,425,427 | 335,251 | 3.8 |
Louisiana |
2,134,410 | 2,006,075 | 128,335 | 6.0 |
Mississippi |
1,348,337 | 1,253,468 | 94,869 | 7.0 |
Texas |
11,259,471 | 10,679,422 | 580,049 | 5.2 |
TOTAL |
25,658,641 | 24,429,920 | 1,228,721 | 4.8 |
Most affected areas* in State |
||||
Alabama |
392,042 | 375,251 | 16,791 | 4.3 |
Louisiana |
1,565,638 | 1,474,668 | 90,970 | 5.8 |
Mississippi |
904,260 | 843,575 | 60,685 | 6.7 |
Texas |
395,282 | 369,241 | 26,041 | 6.6 |
TOTAL |
3,257,222 | 3,062,735 | 194,487 | 6.0 |
* Note: These data represent the 10 counties in Alabama, 34 parishes in Louisiana, 47 counties in Mississippi, and 9 counties in Texas that were designated by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) for both individual and public disaster assistance as of September 30, 2005. |
Source: Local Area Unemployment Statistics
Unemployment rates in Mississippi and Louisiana were somewhat above the national average of 4.9 percent (not seasonally adjusted) in August 2005. Only a handful of parishes in Louisiana had an unemployment rate below 5.0 percent, and more than 20 had rates of 7.0 percent or more. The overall unemployment rate in Louisiana was 6.0 percent in August. In Mississippi, one county did have an unemployment rate under 4.0 percent, but, again, many had rates of 7.0 percent or more, and only one county in the hard-hit southern half of the State had an unemployment rate under 5.0 percent. Mississippi's overall August unemployment rate was 7.0 percent.
In contrast, the unemployment rate was below the national average in Alabama in August 2005. However, five of the ten more heavily affected counties in Alabama had unemployment rates of 6.0 percent or higher.
In Texas, the unemployment rate, at 5.2 percent, was close to the national average in August. However, 7 of the 9 most affected counties in Texas had unemployment rates higher than 6.0 percent. The unemployment rate in Florida was 3.8 percent in August 2005. Data on unemployment and the labor force for States, metropolitan areas, and counties are available online.
State and individual county labor force and unemployment data tables from the Local Area Unemployment Statistics program:
Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, Texas (PDF files).
County unemployment rate maps from the Local Area Unemployment Statistics program:
Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, Texas (PDF files).
Data for September 2005 for areas affected by Katrina and Rita can be found at https://www.bls.gov/katrina/data_after.htm. Those data and the August data presented on this page are not seasonally adjusted; therefore, over-the-month comparisons are discouraged.
According to the National Weather Service, Hurricane Katrina came ashore shortly after 6:00 a.m. on August 29, 2005, in Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, just south of Buras and southeast of New Orleans. At landfall her winds were 140 miles per hour. Continuing northward, the hurricane made a second landfall near the Louisiana-Mississippi State line at 10:00 a.m. with maximum winds near 125 m.p.h. Katrina weakened as it moved inland to the north-northeast but was still a hurricane 100 miles inland near Laurel, Mississippi.
Approximately 38 percent of business establishments in the combined area of Louisiana and Mississippi were within 100 miles of the path of the center of the storm. Approximately 66 percent of establishments in this area were within 200 miles. See map Locations of Business Establishments Relative to the Path of Hurricane Katrina (PDF).
Rita made landfall just east of the Sabine Pass near the Texas-Louisiana border in the early morning hours of September 24 with maximum winds over 105 miles per hour, but weakened relatively quickly as it moved inland. However, forecasts of very heavy rains after the winds subsided proved correct and substantial rainfall caused flooding in parts of Texas and Louisiana (including renewed flooding in New Orleans).
Approximately 7 percent of business establishments in the combined areas of Texas and Louisiana were within 100 miles of the track of the eye of Hurricane Rita and about 27 percent were within 200 miles. See map Business Establishments within Rita-Damaged Areas (PDF).
The Federal Emergency Management Agency has released an imagery-derived assessment of the zones in Louisiana and Mississippi damaged by high winds and floodwaters resulting from Hurricane Katrina. As represented on the map, Business Establishments within Katrina-Damaged Areas as Identified by FEMA (PDF), there were just over 22,000 business establishments in areas of Louisiana and Mississippi that FEMA designated as flooded or damaged areas or both.
In some ways, the Katrina story was one of two very different States. In Louisiana, by far the greatest number of establishments within these zones were in flooded areas; the roughly 18,000 establishments in flooded areas employed over 300,000 workers in 2004. These workers accounted for nearly 97 percent of jobs within the FEMA-designated flood and damage zones in Louisiana.
In Mississippi, the circumstances were almost exactly reversed. Only about 1 percent of jobs in the flooded or damaged zones of Mississippi were in flooded areas, while fully 64 percent were in areas that suffered "catastrophic" storm damage, the most severe of the four categories used by FEMA. (See table 6 and the explanation of the four storm damage categories.)
Hurricane Rita was a much less destructive storm. About 800 establishments were in damaged and flooded areas, mostly in and around Beaumont and Port Arthur, Texas, and Lake Charles Louisiana.
Damage Type | ALABAMA (Q:IV 2004) | |||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Establish- ments |
Employ- ment |
Quarterly Wages |
||||
Flooded Area |
3 | 51 | $726,121 | |||
Non-flooded area: |
||||||
Limited Damage |
91 | 1,710 | $16,031,446 | |||
Moderate Damage |
17 | 389 | $3,145,097 | |||
Extensive Damage |
0 | 0 | $0 | |||
Catastrophic Damage |
0 | 0 | $0 | |||
TOTAL |
111 | 2,150 | $19,902,664 | |||
Damage Type | LOUISIANA (Q:IV 2004) | |||||
Establish- ments |
Employ- ment |
Quarterly Wages |
||||
Flooded Area |
18,078 | 305,340 | $2,966,338,291 | |||
Non-flooded area: |
||||||
Limited Damage |
681 | 7,731 | $59,505,161 | |||
Moderate Damage |
140 | 2,055 | $12,701,137 | |||
Extensive Damage |
45 | 577 | $3,717,779 | |||
Catastrophic Damage |
53 | 360 | $4,880,302 | |||
TOTAL |
18,997 | 316,063 | $3,047,142,670 | |||
Damage Type | MISSISSIPPI (Q:IV 2004) | |||||
Establish- ments |
Employ- ment |
Quarterly Wages |
||||
Flooded Area |
71 | 564 | $4,501,983 | |||
Non-flooded area: |
||||||
Limited Damage |
994 | 10,898 | $110,951,079 | |||
Moderate Damage |
586 | 6,075 | $41,556,049 | |||
Extensive Damage |
119 | 2,206 | $14,676,217 | |||
Catastrophic Damage |
1,582 | 35,338 | $247,454,539 | |||
TOTAL |
3,352 | 55,081 | $419,139,867 | |||
Explanation of FEMA Storm Damage Categories
|
Note: Zones that were both flooded and storm-damaged were categorized in the "flooded area" designation. The Katrina-damaged areas are identified at very fine levels of geographic detail. They are distinct from the county level areas designated by FEMA as being eligible for disaster relief in that they have been identified as being within damage zones.
The most recent labor market data available for the affected States and selected metropolitan areas can be found on the following Economy at a Glance pages:
Unemployment rates by county for August 2005 (maps and tables) also are available:
Additional data can be obtained through the following BLS program homepages:
and BLS regional office pages:
Hurricanes Katrina and Rita caused physical and economic disruption over many areas spanning five States. In response, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) designated a number of counties and parishes to receive public assistance to State and local governments and certain private nonprofit organizations for purposes such as debris removal, emergency protective measures, and the repair or replacement of disaster-damaged facilities. A smaller number of counties were also designated for individual assistance to persons and households for housing, medical, dental, funeral, and transportation expenses related to the disaster.
The areas affected by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in BLS calculations were established by referring to the designated counties notices issued by the Federal Emergency Management Agency through September 30, 2005. (See www.fema.gov/news/disasters.fema.)
An area was considered "affected" if it was designated by FEMA for any type of assistance. An area was defined as "most affected" if it was designated for both individual and public assistance. The following list shows all 433 affected counties or parishes; the 100 "most affected" counties or parishes are marked with an asterisk.
Alabama
Florida
Louisiana
Mississippi
Texas
Hurricane Information | Employment and Unemployment Data Collection and Estimation
Last Modified Date: November 22, 2017