Wall Street firms including Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and JPMorgan Chase & Co. have helped push New York City’s return-to-office rate to almost 80% of its pre-pandemic levels, a rebound also seen in Miami, according to one measure.
RTO rates last year for the two East Coast cities were the highest among seven major U.S. markets and above the national average of about 63%, according to the Placer.ai’s Nationwide Office Building Index. The firm analyzed foot traffic data from about 1,000 office buildings across the country.
Wall Street banks were among the first companies to aggressively encourage—and then require—employees to return to the office, helping drive a rebound in weekday foot traffic in Manhattan. Miami’s resurgence may have benefited from Florida’s early lifting of Covid restrictions and a steady influx of tech companies, according to Placer.ai.
“The analysis suggests that the finance sector has indeed been an important driver of office recovery,” the company said in a report. “Cities with greater shares of employees from this sector tended to experience greater office recovery than other urban centers.”
Residents and tourists have also come back to the New York subway system. Weekday ridership is about 70% of what it was in 2019, up from roughly 10% during the height of the pandemic, according to Metropolitan Transportation Authority data. Weekend usage is about 85% of 2019 levels.
San Francisco saw the greatest growth in office visitation in 2023, but it still lagged behind other major cities, with foot traffic at about 45% of 2019 levels, according to the report.
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.