US citizens Travel stats - Myth???

[Loosehead]

Those stats that you sometimes hear bandied about anyone know if they are just myths or whether they are true? Is there a site that has the figures. You know the sort of thing X% of Americans have no passport etc or X% of US belive the US is the whole world etc etc
This is not a swipe at the US, just trying to resolve an argument, thanks

[annavc]

Hi Loosehead. I don't know exactly how accurate the stats are or where to find accurate ones but I would say they are fairly close to truth, especially the passport one. The USA is such a huge country with such a massive diversity of landscape, entertainments, cities, culture etc. that to be fair to Americans they don't really have to travel outside their own country to experience completely different things to what they have at home. The difference between Connecticut and New Mexico for example is the difference between Liverpool and Marrakech.

From my own experience of studying at an American university it did astound me how limited knowledge of the rest of the world was with a lot of people (not everyone though!). Four times I was complemented on how good my English was, I was asked if you could take the bus from England to America and when I explained that you had to fly or take a ship as there was an ocean in the way I was asked what an ocean was! (and these were university students who you should credit with some intelligence!)

These are extreme examples but real ones and there is a large proportion of Americans who have little or no knowledge of the world outside their own state let alone their own country. But like all stereotypes it doesn't apply to nearly everyone. There are an awful lot of Americans who travel and who are extremely knowleadgeable about the rest of the world.

I'm sure you could quite easily find British people who's knowledge of the rest of the world was severly lacking. They probably think they know all about it because they've been to Magaluf 3 times!

[jno]

http://www.gyford.com/phil/writing/2003/01/31/ how_many_america.php

[Whickerman]

And in fairness, what % of Europeans have been outside Europe?

[Octavius]

To stay in their home country is the rule for many European
holiday makers. This is remarkable in the southern countries (Greece, Spain, Italy, Portugal, France), but also in Finland.

For the others, to go to another European Union country is the principal alternative. This is particularly true for Luxembourg (91% of responses designate another European Union country), Belgium (74%) and Germany (73%).

Around 8% of Europeans on average go outside of Europe for their holidays.