Coming to America? Visitors, ante up

THE United States now requires a would-be tourist to our country to pay $100 for an application to visit.

In June 2002, the cost of a U.S. visitor’s visa (a document that permits a nonimmigrant to travel to the United States for vacation purposes) was raised to $65. In November the price was again increased, this time to $100. And that was only for starters. The $100 charge is for the application only, not the visa itself. If you’re from certain countries, you’ll pay extra for the visa. As for the $100, it’s nonrefundable, even if the visa is denied.

What effect will the $100 charge have? Will fewer residents of Europe, Asia, South America, Australia and elsewhere travel to the U.S. as tourists? In August 2002, after the first increase to $65, demand for nonimmigrant visas fell by about 33%.

In a news release last November, the State Department acknowledged that the number would fall even more. “Won’t this fee cause a further drop in the number of nonimmigrant visa applicants?” it asked in its official statement.

“The Department of State is well aware that this fee increase may further suppress the demand for NIVs (nonimmigrant visas),” the department responded.

In “consultation with the White House’s Office of Management and Budget, the department determined that the shortfall should be met by an increase in the fee rather than by an appropriation of U.S. tax revenues.”

The effect on U.S. hotels, restaurants, airlines, sightseeing operations, shops and more could amount to billions of dollars in lost revenue to the U.S. travel industry.

The increase has touched off reciprocal measures by other countries. Turkey, which needs tourist dollars, has responded to the U.S. increase by implementing a $100 visa application fee from American tourists.

The U.S. seems to take for granted the benefits of incoming foreign tourism and does very little to increase it. Alone among the advanced nations of the world, we have no national entity for the promotion of foreign tourism in our country.

Except for infrequent appropriations by Congress for tourist advertising placed overseas, there is not a single office for tourism that we maintain abroad, no official address to which foreign tourists can write for information about traveling in the United States, not a single official charged with developing policies that will promote such tourism.

The people working in U.S. hotels, restaurants, motor coach sightseeing companies, theme parks and the like may now pay the price, along with those who travel to those countries that will ask for reciprocal fees.