The topic during this weeks economy class was Orlando car rental and the industries it supports. At first I thought this was an incredibly micro economic viewpoint to be learning in a classroom setting, but I soon discovered otherwise.

We actually compared Orlando car rentals with similar statistics from the Las Vegas car rental industry. Given that both cities do amazing amounts of tourist and business travel trade, the whole class was shocked with the professor displayed numbers relating to various aspects of car rental businesses.

More than just being about Orlando or Las Vegas car rentals, however we were looking at the trends these businesses were showing us. When compared to other business statistics that were dependent to a very large degree on tourism or heavy business travel, it was only rental cars that showed analogies that could be backed up by hard economic theory.

Many of the other businesses held bits and pieces of the bigger picture, but none really compared to renting cars to tourists and traveling business men and women. You could put together a wonderful picture of an areas overall economic health by taking stats and charts based on auto rentals and overlaying restaurant and hotel numbers as well as retail and convention bureau facts.

It was all quite interesting and informative.

Technorati Tags: ,