Originally Posted by
KoKoBuddy
Given that most states are bigger and more diverse physically than most Euro countries, I never am impressed by the comparison of Euro vs. American passport ownership as an indication of anything.
Pre EU, a German needed a passport to go to an Italian beach vacation. Doesn't mean the German was "well traveled" anymore than someone from Chicago is "well traveled" by going to Florida for a beach vacation.
I agree that any European country is a bad comparison.
Unfortunately, there aren't many countries as big and wealthy as the US. China, Russia, Brazil and Indonesia would all be good comparisons from a size perspective but not from a wealth or personal freedom perspective.
Canada is one possible comparison. Wikipedia says that the passport ownership rate in Canada is 56.2%. But the population of Canada is concentrated close to the US border, and they don't have any warm vacation destinations of their own, so it isn't surprising that their passport ownership is higher.
Here in Japan, there are about 30 million valid passports for a population of 125 million (official stats in Japanese
here), so the ownership rate is lower than the US, despite the fact that Japan is physically smaller than the US and people tend to have a higher disposable income here. However, Japan has a great deal of geographic diversity (being about as long, from north to south, as the east coast of the US) and also obviously has no land borders with any other countries.