Avedon Carol finds a good article in the IHT - turns out American tourist traffic is down 11% since 2000, even though global tourist traffic is up 28%. Estimated cost to the economy: $100 billion a year. Even with the increasingly worthless dollar, that's a lot of money.
The reasons are obvious: it's hard to get a visa, people are shackled and treated like criminals if and when they do get a visa -- why would anybody go through that willingly when there's the rest of the world to visit?
Good job, America. That'll win the ol' hearts and minds.
Someone else has another opinion about this, it would seem:
http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5h_sIrTh2oD9NwREBogOtBKSdx-Yg
Foreigners' US visits, spending break records in 2007
2 days ago
WASHINGTON (AFP) — International visitors flocked to the United States in record numbers last year and spent an all-time high of 122 billion dollars, the US government said Monday.
Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez announced that 2007 set a record for international tourism as 56.7 million international visitors pumped 122.7 billion dollars into the economy, supporting 8.5 million American jobs.
"This is yet another record-breaking year for the US travel and tourism industry and another year in which it produced a healthy trade surplus," Gutierrez said in a statement.
Spending by international travelers while in the United States, including passenger fares, is defined as a US export.
The 2007 spending by international visitors represented a nearly 14 percent increase over the prior record set in 2006 and a 53 percent increase from the low numbers following the September 11, 2001 terror attacks.
The number of visitors last year marked an increase of 11 percent over 2006 and broke the prior record set in 2000 of 51.2 million visitors.
More than half of the international visitors came to America from neighboring Canada and Mexico, the country's partners in the North American Free Trade Agreement.
Excluding Canada and Mexico, overseas arrivals totaled 23.9 million, up 10 percent from 2006.
However, overseas visitation levels were eight percent lower than the record year of 2000, the Commerce Department noted.
The Travel Industry Association highlighted that weakness, saying the number of visits should be higher because of the declining value of the dollar, which makes travel in the US relatively cheaper.
"America is the world travel bargain, and yet two million fewer travelers visited the United States in 2007 than in 2000," Roger Dow, president and chief executive of the industry group, said in a statement.
"In the current economic environment, the United States should be setting overseas travel records rather than inching back to pre-9/11 standards," he said.
In 2007, the top 10 countries with international visitors coming to the US were: Canada, with 17.74 million; Mexico (15.09 million); Britain (4.5 million); Japan (3.53 million); Germany (1.52 million); France (997,506); South Korea (806,175); Australia (669,536); Brazil (639,431); and Italy (634,152).
US travel and tourism industry is a 1.2-trillion-dollar industry that has generated a trade surplus for 19 consecutive years. It is one of the largest employers in the world's biggest economy.
If you read that carefully, they're comparing apples to oranges. I'm sure that the absolute number of dollars is up -- because the dollar is worth less. The point is that if we didn't shackle people at the airports, perhaps instead of falling 11% in terms of number of people visiting, we could have risen 28%, like the rest of the world.
Actually, this article you've quoted -- and thanks for the substantial followup! -- kind of confusing. The government says it! was! another! recordbreaking! year! but when you get to the actual statistics, did we have more visitors or less? Who can tell?
I'd also to that article in comment #1 that it's bullshit math.
When I go on vacation I'm having a budget of 2000 in Euro since I'm from Europe. And when a currency like the US-$ is pretty weak I have a tendency to spend more in that currency.
In other words:
1€ = 1$
I spend 2000$ or 2000€. The USA can import stuff of 2000€ from my money spent in the USA.
1€ = 1,50$
I spend 3000$ or still 2000€. I may stay at more expensive hotels visit more expensive restaurants.
But the USA can still only import stuff of 2000€ from my money spent in the USA, although I spent more money in US-$.
But since I don't want to be treated like a criminal at immigration I don't visit the USA anymore.
So it's 0€ or 0$.
Right! Commerce is saying that receipts are more than last year without mentioning that the number of tourists has yet to recover to the level of 2000! But the US government can always cite bullshit math because they know the American press will never take the trouble to figure it out.
Kristin: I never realized that, but you're right! I'll bet he's just confused on who we're supposed to be keeping an eye on!