America’s marine economy contributed about $397 billion to the nation’s gross domestic product in 2019 and grew faster than the U.S. economy as a whole, according to the most current results of the first official Marine Economy Satellite Account released by two Department of Commerce agencies.

For these statistics, experts from NOAA and the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) described 10 sectors representing businesses dependent on the nation’s oceans, coasts and Great Lakes between the years 2014 and 2019. Marine-related gross domestic product grew 4.2 percent from 2018 to 2019, faster than the 2.2 percent growth of the total U.S. gross domestic product as measured in inflation-adjusted dollars. Businesses included in the report also generated a total of $665.7 billion in sales and supported 2.4 million jobs in 2019.

The 10 sectors ranked by their sales are:

• Tourism and recreation, including recreational fishing ($235 billion)
• National defense and public administration ($180 billion)
• Offshore minerals ($93 billion)
• Transportation and warehousing ($64 billion)
• Commercial Ship and boat building ($31 billion)
• Living resources, including commercial fishing and aquaculture ($27 billion)
• Utilities ($12 billion)
• Research and education ($10.4 billion)
• Construction ($7.0 billion)
• Professional and technical services ($6.3 billion)

The data, report and other materials are available at: Marine Economy | US Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) and on NOAA’s Digital Coast website. Comments or questions can be sent to: MarineEconomy@noaa.gov.