Study - americans have stopped taking vacations because of War on Terror. *link*
 

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/20/us...gewanted=print

That's bad news. Even a small dip--well 5 or 6%--can have an impact. I would have thought that people would be a lot less inclined to travel overseas and would vacation in the US. Apparently not. :(

I have a sneaking suspicion that the members of FlyerTalk are going to be a strong exception to the study's findings. My leisure travel -- both at home and abroad -- has certainly not abated. And why should it?

I am in agreement with you SAT Lawyer. I have multiple long-haul flights purchased and I am not changing my schedule---period. :)

I think that question may be framed wrong - possibly people are stopping vacations because of the way by terrorists?

If you think that new liquid restrictions are curbing air traffic, can you imagine if 10 airlines had gone down earlier this month?

Other research that I have recently seen indicates that people are getting used to a constant terrorist threat, and have decided to get on with their lifes.
That's exactly how I think: there is a chance that my plane will crash as a result of technical failure or pilot error, there is a chance my taxi to/from the airport will crash as a result of my driver's or someone's elses bad driving, there is a chance that some terrorist will blow up the plane. So what? I will still travel as long as airlines and airports manage to get me through the process in a reasonable time. If the ridiculous waiting times seen at Heathrow become the norm everywhere, that's when I will change my travel routine.

Ditto

I am taking a two weeks vacation overseas this week. I was asked how I was able to go... if I was not affraid with all what was happening. I replied... Why should I? The odds of my plane being blown up are less than the odds of me having a car accident and die..... Must enjoy life before it is all over.... Or cannot do it any more and have the memmories of "I would have liked to... but now I am too old"...

I do think that a large segment of the population has quit flying. My dear parents, who could afford to fly if they wanted to, think nothing of getting on the road and driving from Myrtle Beach (where they live) to Ohio (visiting family). If my nephew makes it to the Olympic Swimming trials in Omaha next year, they'll be there- with car. Sigh. I worry about them.

Dad flew a lot in the 1950s and 1960s- he was in sales for a steel company. A couple of years ago he and my brother took a golfing trip to Scotland. Knowing my brother (doing well financially, generous, a lot of FF miles of his own), I suspect they flew Business class. Still, Dad was just horrified at what an ordeal travel had become. He hasn't flown since.

I think we're looking at two separate issues. Terrorism fear may be affecting overseas travel to many places, and this latest foiled plot won't help in getting infrequent flyers to fly more, even domestically. Hawaii, for example, had been rebounding and benefiting from people not going abroad, but now that flying may take a hit, it could give some gains back a lot like it did after 9/11.

But I think the text of the OP has a lot more to do with private-sector pressures toward profits at the expense of "expendable" benefits like vacations. Too many U.S. employers see vacation as nothing more than an expense that they'll try to cut (easy to measure what it costs, hard to measure what not having it costs). Workplaces are deliberately understaffed, workloads are in constant crisis mode and people are made to constantly fear for their jobs. Perfect breeding ground for all kinds of false urgencies, when the real motivation is even further profit for the employer. End result for the employee: LIVING TO WORK, rather than working to live.

It affects even some pretty high income levels. A good place to start looking for proof there is in the growth of the storage-shed industry, where people get to put many of the "toys" they bought that they never had time for, that no longer fit in the house (crowded out by newer toys they also don't have time for), but that they can't bring themselves to give away because maybe that'd make them face some uncomfortable truths about that whole treadmill.

I agree with those who say there are two separate issues here - fewer vacation days are being taken, but I don't think it has anything to do with terrorism. The overall pace of work these days is far more frantic than it was even 5 years ago - I think that causes a lot of people to curb their time off. At my company, we don't have any set number of vacation days - I tend to take about 3 weeks total, plus the holidays. But five years ago, I won't at a place that did have set numbers of days, and I took my allotted four weeks (plus holidays) religiously, and almost always tried to put in a two-weeker in the spring or fall.

Also, these days when I'm on vacation, I notice that people still try and reach me via cell phone or email. If I want a real vacation, I get out of the country and make it well known to all of my clients that I'm truly gone. (I've been tempted to fib about this - tell 'em I'm going to a remote Nambian village with no high-speed connectivity, even if I just want to go somewhere mellow, like Minnesota.)

As for drive vs. fly, the only change I've made has to do with how hard the legacy airlines attempt to punish you for being non-elite. I don't mind doing it by myself, but I refuse to take my family onto one of the legacies where none of us hold status. It's not like we need to be pampered - AA Gold and UA Premier don't get you that - but to get basic, humane bare-bones respect from a legacy, you must be at least a low-elite. So where UA and AA aren't available, we try and fly WN or YX. Yes, flying cattle car is a far better experience than a legacy non-elite trip. And even though YX does have elite levels, they don't get up in your face about it every 5 seconds if you just want to take a trip or two a year with them. You still get to select seats online before you buy, and you still get passable airport treatment whether checking luggage or not.

The threat of terrorism or the security rules at the airport haven't affected the trips I take one bit. No, I don't like taking off my shoes or (now) having to ask my hotel for toothpaste, but it isn't going to stop me from going the places I want to go. And it doesn't impact my drive vs. fly decision on shorter trips - from KC, with UA, AA, YX, and WN being my four choices, those decisions are pretty clear-cut as it is. If I had NW status, then MSP would be a tougher call... As it is, I don't mind the drive.

I read an article in the paper today and it looks like it was the same study cited by the OP- it did seem more focudes on the issue of how few vacation days Americans take/are entitled to. My new boss, based in London, can't believe how anyone survives with only 2 weeks. He said that at one point he looked at a position in the US and wouldn't have taken it if he had had to get the standard North American vacation provision.

I've had 3 weeks the past few years and have taken most of them, but never more than a week or so at a time. Next year I get 4 weeks and my husband and I are thinking of a longer trip to some of the more remote Eastern European sites (Dubrovnik? the Crimea? Estonia?) with a few nights in Munich in either direction.

Ha. I say that the ongoing housing bust and the end of the HELOCs is going to have a much bigger impact on the average (especially coastal) American's travel habits.

I guess it's like the frog in the pot of water whose heat is slowly turned up -- he doesn't notice he's being cooked. Those of us who've been at it constantly for years have learned to absorb and manage the misery as we go. But I think it's true that last-generation flyers who've been away for awhile find current flying culture extremely stressful. My elderly mom last flew about eight years ago. She found the crowds, delays, rudeness, (pre-9/11) security, and general sourness of the experience so stressful, she swore she'd never board an aircraft again -- and hasn't.

I do find myself thinking more about non-flying domestic vacations though. Flying is work. I'm trying to relax. Why put my family through it?

I work in Human Resources and see the vacation balance payouts when employees leave the job. Most people have taken very little of their vacation balance and see saving it up as a good move politically and economically. Really few people take off much unless it is near a Holiday and just a day here and there. The days of long vacations for younger workers is gone.