Boston’s economy shows promising signs of recovery from the pandemic, city officials say, despite concern from business groups about declining commercial property values. An annual report the Boston Planning and Development Agency released Tuesday analyzed key economic indicators — such as employment numbers and wages, inflation, consumer spending, air travel and hotel occupancy rates, and foot traffic. In comparing the 2023 numbers to previous years going back to 2019, the report found, many of those metrics have returned to near pre-pandemic levels — with some key exceptions like office vacancy rates.
Despite those persisting challenges, which Mayor Michelle Wu emphasized are not unique to Boston, the figures show that the city is in the midst of a strong recovery from the major economic downturn in 2020, Wu said. Advertisement “We see lower [office] vacancy rates than in many parts of the country, increasing foot traffic, our public safety numbers are just incomparable in any other city,” Wu said at a media briefing on the report Monday. “We know that the excellent delivery of city services for clean, safe, beautiful streets, walkable communities, access to health care and all of that, that in some cases we take for granted in our incredible city, actually puts us just on a different baseline than a lot of other places.
” According to the report, Boston added more than 10,000 jobs last year, and employee numbers now exceed those from 2019. Average consumer spe.