A comprehensive look at the forest products industry’s economic contribution to the United States: Pre- and post-COVID analysis

Jagdish Poudel and Ram Dahal

Forest Policy and Economics, 2025, vol. 172, issue C

Abstract: This paper examines the U.S. Forest products industry's economic performance in 2022 compared to pre-COVID-19 levels, highlighting its resilience amid pandemic disruptions. Despite a slight decline of 0.27 % in direct forest product industry jobs, the industry's total value-added increased by 14.46 %, with growth observed in labor income and gross output. However, the extent of changes varied across sectors: while paperboard container manufacturing, paper mills, and sawmills saw substantial value-added increases (23 %, 45.45 %, and 54.66 %, respectively), pulp mills, wood office furniture manufacturing, and stationery product manufacturing experienced declines (6 %, 12.5 %, and 3.4 %, respectively). These findings reveal the uneven changes within the industry and underscore the challenges faced by certain subsectors. Overall, the study reinforces the forest products industry's crucial role in supporting both regional and rural economies. The results provide valuable insights for policymakers and industry professionals, emphasizing the need for targeted support to enhance the sector's resilience and ensure its continued growth and economic contribution.

Keywords: Forest products industry employment; Forest products industry output; Forest industry trends; IMPLAN; Input-output model; Economic contributions (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S138993412500019X
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:forpol:v:172:y:2025:i:c:s138993412500019x

DOI: 10.1016/j.forpol.2025.103440

Access Statistics for this article

Forest Policy and Economics is currently edited by M. Krott

More articles in Forest Policy and Economics from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().