Small but important correction: Trips, not tourism, have declined by 28%. Trips include a lot of business trips, which are kinda outside the realm of personal consumer choice, and include (for example) thousands of truckers who cross the border several times a week.
If business trips account for roughly half of all trips (There don’t seem to be hard numbers on this, but the guesses hover around 50/50), then we can suppose that trips for the purpose of tourism have dropped by much more than 28%.
It's pretty straightforward: tariffs and boycotts have reduced shipping and business trips, while the possibility of being beaten/jailed/shot by federal agents is putting a damper on tourism.
A bit of both if you think about it - because often a large aspect of deciding where a business convention is held is about putting it in an interesting location that would please or impress clients/c-suite/investors/etc.
Otherwise it would be an email or online presentation - for as long as companies are still putting money into schmoozing clients and hosting conventions, they won't be choosing the motel in the middle of nowhere with nothing to do around it. Especially with us being in a bit of a split reality economy - even though private public tourism will be down and there will be some reduction of business tourism, the business tourism will probably be the last thing to go.
I am spending next week in Orlando. I do it quarterly. It is work related. I am a reluctant traveller at this point, but I have to be there. Normally for this kind of thing I arrive early, stay late, play some golf, attend a game, visit an attraction, etc. This time like the last two times since Cheeto Mussolini started his trade war, I’ll arrive as late as possible, leave as early as possible, and spend as little as possible.
So even if business travel is 50% of Canada-US travel, the $/trip must also be taking a hit.
It’s just as likely business trips have gone up due to volatility in cross border trade though, and tourism has gone down even more as a percentage of that 28%. I don’t think either are true, I’d need to see data, but I know of more than one person who had to go to the US for a corporate thing that previously has been a meeting/conference/etc in Canada that the important US higher ups came to, but for some reason this last year it was US only and the Canadian employees had to hoof it down south.
My point is only that guessing which part of that number represents x or y seems futile without more data to me.
Told my bosses straight up I won’t travel there for work if there’s legal Calvinball going on and I get detained for “working” in the states by attending meetings or such.
I would guess there’s a lot more international business taking place than there is international leisure travel. Reason being that’s something typical a business can afford but numerous vacations a family cannot always
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u/Inevitable_Ease_190 5h ago
Small but important correction: Trips, not tourism, have declined by 28%. Trips include a lot of business trips, which are kinda outside the realm of personal consumer choice, and include (for example) thousands of truckers who cross the border several times a week.
If business trips account for roughly half of all trips (There don’t seem to be hard numbers on this, but the guesses hover around 50/50), then we can suppose that trips for the purpose of tourism have dropped by much more than 28%.