GUWonder

So has Florida's marketshare of international long-haul tourism traffic increased relative to other big tourism-drawing countries over what it was pre-9/11? If so, great news. If not, even good news is not as great as it could be if perceptions of the US -- primarily about the visa-related headaches -- were more improved. There are more jobs and better paying jobs in the US that would be part of the picture if the US were to be even more receptive to foreign tourists than is currently the case.

The USTA is not ignoring it, but they do have an agenda which only benefits from not playing down the loss of marketshare. And their agenda would enrich the US.

Brazil has had visa on arrival in most of Europe since 1996, yet the US seems to have not got around to it during the period to present starting with when the US started requiring Brazilians to have a visa issued prior to travel to the US.

C010T3

Actually, it's no visa at all.

GUWonder

That is indeed one way of putting it, as it has been the same for Brazilian citizens as for US citizens since 1996; but some call an immigration entry stamp on arrival in a foreign passport a visa on arrival even as it is free and an ink stamp rather than a paper one.

C010T3

There's definitely a difference. If it were visa, Brazil would require a visa as well because of reciprocity mandated by law. The problem is that "visa on arrival" doesn't exist in Brazil. Every country that offers that option does it unilaterally, since Brazil cannot reciprocate.

GUWonder

My apologies for being less clear than I should have been when saying "visa on arrival". I did that because some consider "visa on arrival" to perhaps include all circumstances of legitimate cross-border travel meeting both of the following conditions:

1. not required to send a passport in to a foreign country's embassy/consulate/other government-retained facility (in a place other than the receiving country) for permission to travel and/or enter the foreign country that is not that of one's own nationality/citizenship; but

2. requirement, applied or not, to satisfy the visit-purpose-related demands/purpose-verification requirements of the border control authorities in order to be granted permission to enter.

As in all of my posts in this thread where I mentioned 1996 in conjunction with Brazil, I was commenting in relation to entering much of Europe without having to get a visa in advance of travel to the other country/travel area.

EU Schengen Zone nationals in the main have reciprocity with Brazilian nationals in entering each others' area without needing to send their passport to an embassy/consulate or other government-retained facility to get a stickered visa in the passport for tourism and some other purposes. The visa-acquisition inconvenience (i.e. of having to send their passport to an embassy/consulate or other government-retained facility to get a stickered visa in the passport even for tourism visits) when it comes to Brazilians visiting the US is why some leisure and business meetings end up in the EU which could otherwise have taken place in the US.

7Continents

This is super interesting and I like the fact that people are sticking to the big picture rather than individual experiences. I'd just like to add that the US is a much bigger place then most other tourist countries. I've had my share of visa requirements and question answering sessions, some of which seemed like a fishing expedition to put me in jail and throw away the key and some unexpected ease of procedures such as in Vietnam.
Some of it is safety, some is political tit for tat, and having a good friend who was an immigration supervisor at Heathrow for some years, some for the craziest eventualities.
I live in NY and tourism is alive and well.

GUWonder

If USTA had its way, tourism to NYC would be even stronger than it already is and the Manhattan hotel rates and the income of those employed in relevant sectors in the area would be higher than what is currently the situation.

cordelli

Does anybody know where the raw numbers are coming from?

I would love to know what 17.3% of the total travel market in 2011 would be, and if the US could even begin to sustain that number of tourists.

GUWonder

International tourism arrivals and international tourism receipts are kept track of by countries.

The UN's World Tourism Organization gets numbers reported up by UN member states. And most such countries keep track of tourism traffic and foreign tourism revenue because that figures out in the national financial accounts that countries report out to their own domestic audiences and to international audiences.

florin

How so?

Besides the unemployment and lay offs, in Europe, where unemployment has been soaring, there are plenty of people who would have gone on vacation to the US but who, due to the economic downturn, instead go somewhere closer to home. US thus loses market share, while the same number of tourists travel.

With everyone in Europe getting the austerity bandwagon, many state employees have seen their income decrease (as well as those with income indirectly coming from the state), and with taxes going up (e.g. VAT rates), the purchasing power has overall decreased significantly.

I dislike the US entry and security hassles just like everyone else, but it's silly to ignore the economic aspect.

I would also like to point out that the US is far away from most countries, and those in Europe and Asia have plenty of alternatives that are cheaper and closer to home. (I guess Brazil is the exception here, because Europe and Asia are also very far away.)

Quite the opposite is true. With the worries surrounding the Euro, the 1 EUR is ~1.33 USD, while a few years ago it was ~1.55 USD. The US just got more expensive.

NPF

You're considering only the Euro; for most other currencies in the world, the dollar has weakened lately.

GRALISTAIR

While the sheer number of visitors to the United States has risen over the last 10 years, the number of travelers worldwide has grown even more in that time. As a result, the United States’ share of the total travel market is down, to 11.2 percent in 2010 from 17.3 percent in 2000.

It is no coincidence that Britain is one of the first targets of the marketing efforts. Over the last 10 years, the proportion of travelers coming to the United States “fell most dramatically in the U.K.,” said Geoff Freeman, the chief operations officer of the U.S. Travel Association. There were also big declines in the same period in travel from France (down 23.2 percent), Brazil (down 20.3 percent), Germany (down 19.2 percent) and Japan (down 5.8 percent).

I still found this bit the most interesting. I love returning to the USA btw

hfly

Regarding the Brazilians, if their citizens only stopped overstaying and violating their US visas in large numbers, then they would be in the VWP (as Argentina once was) however as they have not even come close, it won't happen. Truth be told, something like, 30% of the Brazilian middle class is ALWAYS in possession of a US visa of one sort or another and with the new mandate which will pretty much let anyone with a heartbeat and a bank account and no felonies get a US visa. When you consider that over 90% of Brazilians who apply for visas currently get them, the issue will be null and void within 2 years. If the Brazilians only dropped their fee - Their reciprocity narrative is not fully truthful as while the US required visas of their citizens first, it was they that introduced such fees IIRC in 1994 or so, and while certain rises were instigated by the US, and events like 9/11 changes some things, they in fact started the fee thing.

The funny thing is that Greece only got into VWP a few years ago, and most probably will be ejected by 2015 if things do not change.

GUWonder

Brazil is under consideration to be accepted into the VWP and seems to be getting much closer to getting accepted.

For most of the most recent ten year period where the US has lost marketshare, the US has lost out even on the segment that is just long-haul marketshare; and the USD has actually weakened substantially against the EUR during the same period.

When the EUR became a retail currency for daily street use -- on January 1, 2002 -- less than $0.90 bought 1 EUR; yet for the better part of the period in which the US has lost out even on the EU long-haul market segment the EUR has jumped in value such that for the better part of the last decade, more than $1.25 has been required to buy 1EUR. In other words, the US has lost marketshare despite the world's second largest reserve currency having gained substantial value against the USD, as have many the currencies of various other countries that send lots of tourists our way. The US has become a cheaper destination in the main and yet lost marketshare.

... and this loss of US marketshare has occurred even for travel sourced from markets where unemployment has fallen from its peak in the the last decade.

GRALISTAIR

I have learned when I get interogated by CBP to just smile and be polite. This is relevant because those people are the front line to tourists.