Leasing is an auto industry shorthand term for a long-term rental of a new vehicle, a method often used by businesses that provide company cars for their employees. But leasing is incredibly popular in the consumer market as well. Experian reports 26.66% of all new vehicles were leased in the first quarter of 2021—down from 30.68% in the first quarter of 2020, before the coronavirus hit the U.S. economy and workforce.

Photo Credit: Alamy Stock Photo Perhaps no part of daily life changed as much by the COVID-19 pandemic as mobility—how often residents leave their homes and where they go. With stay-at-home orders in effect for large parts of last year, Americans upended their daily routines and, where possible, began working from home, increasing their reliance on delivery services, and avoiding public spaces, including public transportation. Amid these changes, it wasn’t immediately clear how consumer spending and borrowing would be impacted, especially for cars and trucks.

Photo Credit: Alamy Stock Photo During the COVID-19 pandemic, millions of workers transitioned to working from home all or part of the time. At its peak, about 35% of workers teleworked because of the pandemic. However, many jobs are not conducive to working from home —a fact that has been especially challenging for parents with kids living at home. Besides reduced flexibility in work location, workers who can’t telecommute also tend to earn less, which for parents, limits alternative childcare options.

Nestor Rizhniak // Shutterstock If you want proof that the COVID-19 pandemic didn’t affect everyone equally, look no further than car-buying trends. While overall car sales in 2020 were down 14.6% year-over-year, dealer profits ballooned by 48%, according to 2020 survey results from the National Automobile Dealers Association. Tighter inventories, reduced workforces, and less—if any—need for dealer incentives all contributed to the spike in dealer profits. Profits were also aided by the kinds of cars being sold off the lot.

Photo Credit: Alamy Stock Photo Car travel is a uniquely American obsession. Part of this fact is practical reality: in comparison to most other developed nations, the U.S. has a land area that is larger, cities that are less densely populated, and mass transit infrastructure that is less robust. As a result, the ability to travel by car is almost essential for getting around, and by most metrics of car usage, the U.

Canva Commuting to work isn’t fun for anyone, but when it comes to U.S. commutes, some have it worse than others. In recent years, you may have seen the term “supercommuter,” which is defined as a person who commutes 90 minutes or more to work each way. Many supercommuters live in coastal metro areas (such as New York City, the Bay area, and the Los Angeles area), which have high population density and where the cost of housing is expensive, pushing workers to live in the outlying areas.

Americans drove an estimated 13% fewer miles in 2020, likely due to stay-at-home orders during the pandemic, yet the country experienced an astounding 24% jump in the rate of road-related deaths over the year before, according to the National Safety Council (NSC). The jump represents the largest year-over-year increase calculated by the NSC in 96 years, which representatives say highlights the dire need for the U.S. to prioritize road safety.

Photo Credit: Alamy Stock Photo The American car culture is slowly shifting. Vehicle sales have been declining for years, and fewer workers are commuting by car. More recently, the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic caused auto sales to crash temporarily. But even as the industry has rebounded, the long-term effects on the auto industry remain uncertain. With millions of Americans working from home, fewer people are commuting, but fewer people also want to take public transportation.

Thanakorn.P // Shutterstock States with the highest gas tax The coronavirus pandemic has curbed Americans’ love for the road, keeping many people at home in the past year and cutting into sales at the fuel pump. That has meant a backlog in work funded by gasoline taxes. More than $8.5 billion worth of highway work and other infrastructure projects across the United States have been canceled or halted temporarily, the American Road and Transportation Builders Association told the Washington Post.

Photo Credit: Alamy Stock Photo Nearly one year into the COVID-19 pandemic, the used car market continues to shift and recover in response to changes in driving preferences and disruptions to the global supply chain brought on last year. On the supply side, one of the major challenges for the car market in general has been the fact that manufacturers produced fewer new vehicles in the first half of 2020.