FIRE stands for Finance Insurance and Real Estate in finance and banking. FIRE economy is a sector that includes banks and credit unions, real estate agencies, mortgage brokers, investment brokerages, credit card companies, hedge funds, etc. The FIRE economy has developed to become a significant contribution to the entire economy of the United Estates.
About the FIRE industry
The FIRE industry is very closely tied with all industries. As such, industry activity will typically tend to follow the business cycle as spending a big-ticket items such as automobiles and property trends to increase when the economy is strong and decrease during recessionary periods. The FIRE industry has grown throughout the pandemic as, according to statistics Canada, FIRE’s GDP increased by 3.6% from 2020 to 2021
Within FIRE, finance is the largest sub-industry and consists of banking and leading activities. Insurance employs the second largest amount of people in the industry. The sub-industry contains insurance careers, agencies and brokerages; and other insurance-related activities. The real estate sub-industry employs real estate agents, landlords, property managers, etc,; and the rental and leasing sub- industry is comprised of auto rental and leasing, consumer goods rental, and industrial equipment rental and leasing.
Recent History
Employment in the FIRE industry has generally been steady in the past year with employment being slightly above its pre-pandemic level and that of all industries. This is expected as many services in the industry were already being delivered remotely, meaning the industry was able to mitigate the negative employment effects of COVID restrictions by more easily adapting to telework. Also, there were no significant layoffs during the peak of the pandemic which made it easier for the industry to continue growing. Climate change and the subsequent rise of natural disaster policies have led to growth in the insurance industry. Specifically, in insurance sub-industry has grown in the last few years as a result of an uptick in fire and flood policies. Also the increased reliance on the internet and technology has led to increased usage of cybersecurity policies. Thus, newer insurance products along with population growth have led to steady gains in the insurance sub-industry.
