The US Plan of Attracting 100 Million Tourists Is Not Practical

In the recent national travel and tourism strategies, the Obama administration proposed that the United States aim to attract 100 million international tourists each year by the end of 2012. The purpose of this strategy is to create more employment for the United States through a series of development acts to promote tourism. Is this tourism strategy practical? Well-known financial commentator Dai Peng made a comment.

Peng: If we start from a very simple question, we find that first, the United States is a great power, but can such a great power open such a large market to the rest of the world? Another 100 million people means that one person among every 60 people will travel to the U.S. each year, except Americans and a small number of people from developed countries who have visited the U.S. Can the reception capabilities of the entire U.S. society, including personnel training, adapt to this demand? It is obviously a question mark. Even if they can provide the appropriate facilities, then whether there is a big enough tourist market offered by the world is a new question.

In other words, the majority of developing countries — the biggest market that Americans are concerned about — do want to travel to the U.S. But for them, solving their own employment issues and the problem of their own livelihoods is more important. Although the U.S. currently has made a number of so-called victories in anti-terrorism wars, some deep problems of anti-terrorism wars have not been fundamentally changed. The U.S. homeland security situation remains severe.

Under these circumstances, I think the market is not optimistic that U.S. immigration policy can be adjusted accordingly with regard to the speed of border clearance and visa applications in order to achieve the goal of hosting one hundred million people. We believe that although it is a very good goal, there are a series of deep-seated problems that exist within the infrastructure of market supplies, labors and rules and regulations. Therefore, it does not seem like a practical plan.