IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/jrp/jrpwrp/2008-037.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Cultural Effects on Inbound Tourism into the USA: A Gravity Approach

Author

Listed:
  • Christoph Vietze

    (Friedrich-Schiller University Jena, Department of Economics, Chair for Economic Policy)

Abstract

In this paper we discuss the effects of cultural - and particular religious - factors on tourist flows into the USA as the world largest tourism destination. To estimate this empirically we run an augmented gravity equation. Our results give evidence that the gravity equation is an adequate instrument to explain variations in international tourist flows. With respect to the aim of the paper, we have found that cultural proximity between country of origin and country of destination have positive effects on the tourism flows between these countries. In particular, after controlling for a set of geographic variables, people from countries with the same language (English) and the same high governmental rankings like the USA, travel more into the USA for holiday than people from other countries. Above all, we have clear and stable evidence that tourists from Christian countries prefer the USA as holiday destination much stronger than people from other countries. This supports our argument that people wishing to go on holiday to countries with a similar cultural and political background.

Suggested Citation

  • Christoph Vietze, 2008. "Cultural Effects on Inbound Tourism into the USA: A Gravity Approach," Jena Economics Research Papers 2008-037, Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena.
    • Handle: RePEc:jrp:jrpwrp:2008-037
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://oweb.b67.uni-jena.de/Papers/jerp2008/wp_2008_037.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Tiago Neves Sequeira & Carla Campos, 2007. "International Tourism and Economic Growth: A Panel Data Approach," Springer Books, in: Álvaro Matias & Peter Nijkamp & Paulo Neto (ed.), Advances in Modern Tourism Research, chapter 0, pages 153-163, Springer.
    2. Bergstrand, Jeffrey H, 1985. "The Gravity Equation in International Trade: Some Microeconomic Foundations and Empirical Evidence," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 67(3), pages 474-481, August.
    3. Leonard Dudley & Ulrich Blum, 2001. "Religion and economic growth: was Weber right?," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 11(2), pages 207-230.
    4. Andreas Freytag & Christoph Vietze, 2013. "Can nature promote development? The role of sustainable tourism for economic growth," Journal of Environmental Economics and Policy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 2(1), pages 16-44, March.
    5. Bergstrand, Jeffrey H, 1989. "The Generalized Gravity Equation, Monopolistic Competition, and the Factor-Proportions Theory in International Trade," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 71(1), pages 143-153, February.
    6. Heath, W. C. & Waters, M. S. & Watson, J. K., 1995. "Religion and economic welfare: An empirical analysis of state per capita income," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 129-142, June.
    7. Willem A. Naudé & Andrea Saayman, 2005. "Determinants of Tourist Arrivals in Africa: A Panel Data Regression Analysis," Tourism Economics, , vol. 11(3), pages 365-391, September.
    8. Takatoshi Ito & Anne O. Krueger, 1997. "Regionalism versus Multilateral Trade Arrangements," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number ito_97-1.
    9. Christoph Vietze, 2011. "What's Pushing International Tourism Expenditures?," Tourism Economics, , vol. 17(2), pages 237-260, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Michele FRATIANNI & Chang HOON HO, 2007. "On the Relationship Between RTA Expansion and Openness," Working Papers 288, Universita' Politecnica delle Marche (I), Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche e Sociali.
    2. Jérôme Trotignon, 2009. "L'intégration régionale favorise-t-elle la multilatéralisation des échanges ?," Post-Print halshs-00335633, HAL.
    3. Boopen Seetanah & Ramesh Durbarry & J.F. Nicolas Ragodoo, 2010. "Using the Panel Cointegration Approach to Analyse the Determinants of Tourism Demand in South Africa," Tourism Economics, , vol. 16(3), pages 715-729, September.
    4. Yang, Chih-Hai & Lin, Hui-Lin & Han, Chia-Chun, 2010. "Analysis of international tourist arrivals in China: The role of World Heritage Sites," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 31(6), pages 827-837.
    5. C.de Sá Porto, Paulo & Roberto Azzoni, Carlos, 2006. "How International Integration Affects the Exports of Brazilian States," TD NEREUS 1-2006, Núcleo de Economia Regional e Urbana da Universidade de São Paulo (NEREUS).
    6. Lorde, Troy & Li, Gang & Airey, David, 2014. "Modeling Caribbean Tourism Demand: An Augmented Gravity Approach," MPRA Paper 95476, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    7. Vangelis Tzouvelekas, 2007. "Accounting for pairwise heterogeneity in bilateral trade flows: a stochastic varying coefficient gravity model," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 14(12), pages 927-930.
    8. Carlos Azzoni & Paulo Sa-Porto, 2005. "Competitiveness, commercial blocks, and regional growth," ERSA conference papers ersa05p783, European Regional Science Association.
    9. Baier, Scott L. & Bergstrand, Jeffrey H., 2001. "The growth of world trade: tariffs, transport costs, and income similarity," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(1), pages 1-27, February.
    10. Trotignon, Jérôme, 2010. "Does Regional Integration Promote the Multilateralization of Trade Flows?: a Gravity Model Using Panel Data," Journal of Economic Integration, Center for Economic Integration, Sejong University, vol. 25, pages 223-251.
    11. Soloaga, Isidro & Alan Wintersb, L., 2001. "Regionalism in the nineties: what effect on trade?," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 12(1), pages 1-29, March.
    12. Michele Fratianni & Chang Hoon Oh, 2009. "Expanding RTAs, trade flows, and the multinational enterprise," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 40(7), pages 1206-1227, September.
    13. Shun-Chiao Chang & Fav-Tsoin Lai, 2011. "Intra-Continental and Intercontinental Service Trade in the Travel and Tourism Industry," Tourism Economics, , vol. 17(5), pages 963-982, October.
    14. Trotignon, Jérôme, 2010. "La Restriction des émissions de CO2 pénalise-t-elle les exportations? Un modèle de gravité avec données de panel et variables muettes régionales," L'Actualité Economique, Société Canadienne de Science Economique, vol. 86(1), pages 5-33, mars.
    15. Céline CARRERE, 2003. "Revisiting the Effects of Regional Trading Agreements on trade flows with Proper Specification of the Gravity Model," Working Papers 200310, CERDI.
    16. Martínez-Zarzoso, Inmaculada & Felicitas, Nowak-Lehmann D. & Horsewood, Nicholas, 2009. "Are regional trading agreements beneficial?: Static and dynamic panel gravity models," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 20(1), pages 46-65, March.
    17. Thompson, Gary D. & Cepeda, Ricardo Cavazos, 2002. "Gauging The Recent Effects Of The North American Free Trade Agreement," Journal of Food Distribution Research, Food Distribution Research Society, vol. 33(1), pages 1-13, March.
    18. Inmaculada Martínez-Zarzoso & Felicitas Nowak-Lehmann D. & Nicholas Horsewood, 2006. "Effects of Regional Trade Agreements Using a Static and Dynamic Gravity Equation," Ibero America Institute for Econ. Research (IAI) Discussion Papers 149, Ibero-America Institute for Economic Research.
    19. Thomas L. Vollrath & Mark J. Gehlhar & Charles B. Hallahan, 2009. "Bilateral Import Protection, Free Trade Agreements, and Other Factors Influencing Trade Flows in Agriculture and Clothing," Journal of Agricultural Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(2), pages 298-317, June.
    20. Peter Egger & Douglas Nelson, 2011. "How Bad Is Antidumping? Evidence from Panel Data," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 93(4), pages 1374-1390, November.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    tourism; cultural factors; religion;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F14 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Empirical Studies of Trade
    • L83 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Services - - - Sports; Gambling; Restaurants; Recreation; Tourism
    • Z12 - Other Special Topics - - Cultural Economics - - - Religion

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:jrp:jrpwrp:2008-037. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Markus Pasche (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.jenecon.de .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.