Remote work and long weekends help boost local economies

For the many U.S. workers who have clung to remote work in the aftermath of the pandemic, weekend travel has become a lot easier.

Employees in varied industries are still logging in five days a week, but they don't have to wait until Friday evening to hit the road for the weekend, or rush back to their desks come Monday morning. And It turns out workers' taking longer trips also benefits the economy by boosting spending on services. 

This shakeup of the traditional work week thanks to increased flexibility for workers is helping business like hotels and restaurants that benefit from people traveling more, Axios markets correspondent Emily Peck told CBS News. Remote work means people "are traveling more on the weekends and they're spending more money doing that traveling," she said.

Meanwhile, high-profile events like Taylor Swift's sold-out concert tour are good for local economies. 

"People have bought tickets to these concerts and turned them into big events," Peck said. "You stay in a hotel maybe two nights, you're going out to restaurants, you're spending a lot more money."

Indeed, fans flocking to see the pop artist live has been so beneficial to local economies that it's even been dubbed the "Taylor Swift effect." The Federal Reserve noted that May was the strongest month for hotel revenue in Philadelphia since the onset of the pandemic, in large part thanks to Swift. 

Strong spending on services is a bright spot in the economy, Peck noted. During the pandemic, when attending a concert was out of the question, Americans were instead inclined to spend on categories like home furnishings. But that pattern has shifted.

"Services spending is really holding up at a higher rate than goods spending," Peck said. "It's really stuck around longer than revenge spending, and it's just for a lot of people a new lifestyle, a new way of being where you look at that two day weekend and you see more possibilities."