Alaska Fish Factor

The preliminary value to fishermen of the nearly 41 million salmon caught this summer at Alaska’s largest fishery at Bristol Bay is nearly $248 million, 64% above the 20-year average. That figure will be much higher when bonuses and other price adjustments are paid out.

But as with the fish dollars tallied from Alaska’s cod, pollock, flounders and other groundfish, the bulk of the Bristol Bay’s salmon money won’t be circulating through Alaska’s economy because most of the fishing participants live out of the state.

In 2017, for example, 62% of gross earnings from the Bristol Bay driftnet fishe...