The US Government has found a simple way to arrest the slide in falling inbound tourism.
It is going to stop reporting data.
The Commerce Department’s National Travel and Tourism Office said it is suspending the reporting of the data – because it is wrong.
It blames ‘technical issues with a significant number of records’ whereby some foreign arrivals are being wrongly classified as US nationals.
So much for the Trump Slump.
"The National Travel and Tourism Office is committed to providing accurate statistics on international travelers to the United States as defined by international standards for the travel and tourism sector," said Isabel Hill, the office director.
The NTTO data has shown a marked decline while Customs and Border Protection figures say inbound tourism has risen 4% in the last fiscal year.
The NTTO has found the difference to be ‘meaningful and increasing number’ and no new arrivals data since March 7 will be publically released.
Travel and tourism accounted for 11% of all US exports and one third of all services exports, the NTTO said.
