With all of the store closings in our area during the past few years, including the near extinction of Kmart, it isn’t hard to get on the naysayer bandwagon espousing all things e-commerce. Not so fast, says Moody’s.

The last few years have seen a bevy of high-profile retailers either go bankrupt or close stores across the country, raising concern that brick-and-mortar retailers are doomed. It’s undoubtedly true that consumers are buying more and more goods online, and that’s putting pressure on some retailers. However, it’s important to put this in context: So far, the overall decline of brick-and-mortar retail is a relatively minor change in the economy, and not a major structural disruption.

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It’s not hard to see why the “death of retail” story has gotten so much traction in the anecdote-driven news world. It’s easy to find examples across the country of empty malls, vacant big boxes, and abandoned retail strips that create the impression that the demand for brick-and-mortar shopping has cratered. However, the data tell a different story.

Still near historical high

In the aggregate, it’s true that employment has flatlined at brick-and-mortar retailers, which we define as NAICS codes 44 and 45 minus nonstore retailers. However, despite the weak recent growth, brick-and-mortar retail employment is still close to a historical high at 15.3 million, falling only 22,000 jobs below the peak reached in 2017.

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