Even in Orange County, schools and health care employ more residents than hospitality

Tourism is what the rest of the world knows about Central Florida. In Orange County, it is also how an unusually large share of residents pay the rent.

In Orange County, nearly 1 in 6 employed residents works in arts, entertainment, recreation, accommodation and food services, the Census Bureau's 2020-2024 American Community Survey found. That is the industry group that covers hotel rooms, restaurant kitchens, theme parks and stages. Its share of the county's workforce is 16.3%.

That share is well above Florida's 10.9%, in a state that hardly lacks for tourists. Head west down the interstate, and the gap gets wider. In Tampa's Hillsborough County, the other big anchor of the corridor, 9.1% of working residents hold these jobs, which leaves Orange 7.2 percentage points higher.

Nationally, the share is 8.7%. Orange County runs 7.6 percentage points above the U.S.

Among the counties the Chronicle compared, Orange ranked second. Only Clark County, Nevada, home to Las Vegas, leans harder on the trade. There, 22% of working residents are in the sector, and Orange trails by 5.7 percentage points.

Bexar County, Texas, which includes tourism-heavy San Antonio, comes in at 10.6%, or 5.7 percentage points below Orange.

Record crowds, and one soft spot

The census figures span 2020 through 2024, with a margin of error of about 0.7 percentage points on the Orange County share, so they predate last year's tourist season. That season was a big one. Visit Orlando says the destination welcomed more visitors in 2025 than in any year in its history (visitorlando.org).

Most of them came to play rather than work. The visitor mix leaned heavily toward domestic leisure travelers (visitorlando.org), though the agency also calls Orlando the nation's leading meetings destination, with its group meetings business growing over the year (visitorlando.org).

Visit Orlando makes the case for what all that traffic means at home in its own words: tourism, it says, "supports local businesses, creates jobs and sustains a quality of life rarely found in destinations of our size" (visitorlando.org).

Not every part of the market grew. International visitation fell in 2025, largely due to a decline in travel from Canada (visitorlando.org). For a workforce this tied to visitors, a dip in any one stream of travelers reaches the hotel desk and the restaurant schedule faster than it would in most places.

Not quite Las Vegas

Orange County's job base has a counterweight that Clark County's lacks. Educational services, health care and social assistance employ 19.6% of working Orange County residents, a bigger share than hospitality claims.

In Las Vegas, the order flips. Clark County's hospitality share of 22% outruns its education and health care share of 16.6%. Orange County leans on the visitor economy far more than Florida or the nation does, but its schools, hospitals and social service agencies still employ more of its residents than the tourism trade.

The tourism trade's health gets a regular public airing. Visit Orlando presents quarterly to the Tourist Development Council and annually to the Board of County Commissioners (visitorlando.org).

For the estimated 123,779 Orange County residents who work in hospitality, food service and entertainment, those reports are about more than visitor counts. They are a reading on the job market they depend on.

About the data

We used the Census Bureau's American Community Survey multiyear estimates for 2020-2024 on the share of employed working-age residents in arts, entertainment, recreation, accommodation and food services. We compared Orange County with Florida, the U.S. and peer counties chosen for similar size or a similar tourism economy, including Clark County, Nevada; Bexar County, Texas; and Hillsborough County, Florida. Differences between Orange County and the comparison places were tested against the survey's margins of error and are statistically significant.

• These are survey estimates averaged over 2020 through 2024, so they carry a margin of error and do not reflect 2025 or 2026 conditions.
• The figures count where workers live, not where they work, so Orange County residents with jobs in Osceola or elsewhere are included and commuters from other counties are not.
• The data shows how many people work in the industry, not their wages, hours or whether those jobs are full time.

Arts, entertainment, recreation, accommodation and food services: a Census Bureau industry group covering businesses such as hotels, restaurants, bars, amusement and theme parks, and performing arts and sports venues. Percentage points: the simple difference between percentages, such as the gap between one county's share and another's.

Sources

• U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey: Industry by Occupation for the Civilian Employed Population 16 Years and Over (ACS 5-year 2020–2024), latest period 2024; retrieved Oct. 19, 2026. Data