Vacation? In this economy?

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If you want to learn how to buy or rent in this economy, give this episode a listen wherever you get your podcasts or watch on YouTube.com/yourrichbf. "I need a vacation. I'm talking about the type of vacation you have on your side with your work in Canary, you can't reach nobody can, nobody reach you." It's really starting to become overpriced at travel through the states.

"I know we live in imperialist lands, but if you ain't got no money to go on a vacation, stay home." Okay, you guys, it's time to admit something. I'm really, really bad at taking time off work. The last time I took a week long vacation was about a year ago, and I know I'm the walking

cliche of the American with PTO doesn't take it, but part of the reason why is that for

something that's allegedly relaxing and fun, vacations are a lot of planning and even

more money. Plain tickets, hotels, food, and of course, I got a buy that corny souvenir shot glass. I'm John Flynn Hill, and today I'm explaining it to me from Vox, how to get that recharge you deserve, even if you're on a budget.

“So am I alone in how difficult it is to get an vacation these days?”

I asked business insiders Emily Stewart. It's a tricky year for vacation. Wow, it's me staying in a hotel for three nights, more than my mortgage for the whole month. Out of principle, I'm not paying $800 to fly within the United States, like literally insane to me.

We're on years of inflation happening, and also we're in the midst of a moment where the Warren Iran, where oil prices are really high, and so what does that mean? That means gas prices are really high, that mean prices are really high, that means even maybe your cruise might be a little more expensive, there's a lot of people are looking around, and they're pretty worried about prices.

Now that's not the only thing going on. This is breaking news. U.S. embassies across the Middle East are urging U.S. citizens to reconsider travel to the region. American tourists and ports of ours are now sheltering in place as flights out there get

canceled. Earlier this year, also all of the stuff with TSA and the airports being a mess. It is in this country a horrible day to fly every time we check the agony gets worse now, 9,300 flights delayed nationwide.

“So a lot of people, I think, just this summer, kind of looking around and being like, "Oh,”

I want to go on vacation, but also, is this going to be a really expensive disaster?" How are travel companies responding to people who want to, you know, enjoy vacation, but they're worried about money? The story I feel like of consumers, American consumers in the past like 60 years has been, things are expensive and they're doing a lot of stuff anyway, right?

And they're mad about it. They're mad about vacation with their taking vacation. And that is true now still to some extent. The Delta CEO recently said in their earnings report, like, we've raised prices, but we think that those prices have staying power.

And he said he kind of feels like Delta is competing on service more than price now. Delta's not a low-cost airline. We can't win by trying to provide the cheapest. We have to be able to win by providing the best. United also said in their earnings, demand was really strong.

Demand is strong for leisure. Demand is really strong across the board. I think the economy is doing, well, probably better than people appreciate. And a lot of these travel companies, whether it be airlines, hotels, are really relying on loyalty programs to kind of get people in the door and say, "Hey, you're all these

perks and benefits," and they want you to book directly with them. So maybe you're like, "I'm on the fence, but you're a Hilton member, you keep getting

That's hot. Totally. Hilton owners.

We keep getting offers from them and eventually you say, "Fine, I'm gonna go on vacation

with them."

“But there's only so much I think some of these companies can give, or at least that they”

want to give that they're willing to give on price at the moment, especially with fuel costs being as high as they are. For vacations, going to become a luxury item, I mean, a vacation by definition is a splurge, but are we getting to the point where only the wealthiest people can afford them? I mean, I don't know if I go as far as to call it a luxury item, but I do think it's becoming

something that's segmented, like, a lot of, like, an economic jargon you hear sometimes about a K-shaped economy, right, where it's, like, it looks like the letter, okay, where one segment of people are going up and one segment of people are going down. This doesn't necessarily mean super rich in everybody else, but it might mean, like, middle

class upper middle class, going up, you know, middle class, lower middle class, going down.

And I do think that we are a little bit in that situation right now with vacation, I was looking at a survey from earlier this year today, and it said that some Americans said they were planning a vacation this year, which is the lowest that they've seen in several years, but, like, spending was up. So when people were on vacation, they were willing to splurge, and now some of that is

people who can afford it, some of it is people who may be going to be paying off a credit card bill for a little bit longer than they would like, but I do think to some extent, this has kind of been the story of the broader economy for, you know, a couple of years now, where people who do have the means are doing, okay, they are still spending, and the people who don't have the means are kind of looking for more ways to cut back.

You mentioned the unrest going on in the world, and how that's impacting vacations.

I'd love to dig into that a little more.

What anxieties are people feeling?

“How is that factoring into how people are taking time off?”

America has not been playing super nice on a policy level with a lot of countries in the past couple of years, whether it be Europe, whether it be Canada. And so, do you think some travelers have this question of, like, will I be welcome? A recent survey by the European Travel Commission shows just 33% of Americans planned to visit Europe this summer, a 7% drop from last year, on ease over how the U.S. is now perceived

sighted as a reason for dampening enthusiasm. That moment when you go into a Northern Ireland bar and are immediately accused of being a bad person because you're from the United States. It doesn't feel very good. Last year, I did a story on Americans kind of feeling a little bit anxious when they're

traveling abroad, and I talked to one woman, I think she was from California who had gone to Canada, and was at a ski resort, and was talking to a Canadian woman. The woman kind of got a little bit prickly about, you know, American Canadian relations, and of course the ladies, like, I have nothing to do with it, but then she and her husband

“had asked for, you know, recommendation on, I think, a ski slope or whatever.”

And the Canadian lady sent them down whatever pad, recommended the path, and it was like a really bad path. And afterwards, she thought, like, does she do that on purpose, or does she get back at Canada? Oh my gosh!

What was just, like, obviously, very much, she didn't know, but she said, you know, I wondered after was she mad at us and, like, you know, forget you guys. Have fun on that bad ski pad. So this is a necessarily, like, a new situation, but I do think some Americans are kind of having this feeling of, you know, will I be super welcome abroad, even though I do

think most people understand that not everybody, every citizen's politics are the same as the federal government's politics. Are there places people are choosing not to travel to right now for whatever reason? A lot of popular international destinations have been kind of Americaned out in the past few years.

You think about places like Japan, Spain, Italy, you have started to be like, hey, guys, like, why are you trying staying home instead of all of you coming to the exact three, you know, three cities and kind of ruining everything, at least their citizens have been a little frustrated. Residents of Mayorka are fed up with mass tourism.

The streets of the Bali, Erich Island filled with protestors over the weekend saying the area has reached a limit in capacity and resources. This is Kyoto today, overcrowded streets, frustrated residents, things like vandalism and litter becoming commonplace throughout the city, Kyoto's infrastructures simply can't keep up.

I was looking at data from this aviation analytics company called Serium and what they had found was that travel from the U.S. to like major destination Europe, about 6% this year

to come here.

“Number one reason why people are wearing the U.S. is the political situation.”

They don't want to endorse the U.S. politics.

We are feeling the Trump slump because of the policies and the war that he's kind of essentially brought on those things have really affected our business and slowed it down. Travel from Europe was down like 9% from last year and so it really is kind of a two-way street at this point and some of it is people not wanting to come here because they're worried about who being stopped at the board and being stopped at the airport, being stopped

by ice. So they're just like not feeling welcome in the U.S. right now. It's also kind of important to point out because so many foreign tourists are not coming

to the states right now that might mean that some popular destinations can have a little

more space, little less lines, think about like the Grand Canyon, you think about Disney. Like it might be nice to kind of go to one of those places and this doesn't mean again that everybody's just staying close to home but I do think it's kind of one of those summers where it's not a bad idea to see what's a little bit more in striking distance and see what you can do.

“So a tighter budget doesn't mean you have to skip out on that beloved PTO.”

The solution might just be a tried and true American tradition. That's next.

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That's TaukayaTree.com/explainet to get matched in minutes. I'm JQ, back with more explained to me. Susan Roo is the author of the book, "Are we there yet?" The Golden Age of American Family Vacations. She also teaches history at Brigham Young University, and she just got back from her very own vacation.

So I went down to Archie's National Park with three of my grandchildren and their parents, and believe you're not yesterday morning, I got up at 5am and hike to the top of Delicate Arch to see the sunrise. Oh my gosh, that sounds beautiful. It was beautiful. Was that three mile hike and it was up all the way, but I'm okay today. But it's wonderful to do. And lots of people were there from all over the world. That seems like a classic American vacation. Tell me about how national parks became so popular.

Going to the National Park was a very economical vacation for people. They could ran and borrow camping equipment. You could take your children to see these wonders of the world. Hmm, unless north or south.

with the advent of the National Park travel by families.

All inspiring wonders of the Grand Canyon of the Colorado, mighty Niagara. This sparkling waters of the life.

“National parks are America's Cathedral. Isn't the magical wonderful and hard vacation is wonderful too?”

Yeah, what's the timing for the popularity of national parks? They became hugely popular after the war, and the family vacation became popular then, in part because of a consumerism, a lot of people were making money and moving to the suburbs and driving in cars. The National Federal Highway Act was announced in 1956, very quickly 1600 miles of highways

all over the country. So people could leave their driveways or their apartments or their city parking

place and get in the car and go anywhere in America for pretty cheap cost. Twenty-eight cents a gallon for gas. That was a long time ago. Oh my gosh, 28-cent gas feels like a totally different world.

“Can you describe how important the automobile was for the American vacation through the years?”

It was hugely important. Car ownership, rose, station wagons peaked in 1956. Today we have SUVs, but back in the day we would just get thrown in the car. Sometimes they would put a blanket over the suitcases, and the children could sprawl out a car

could be had for $2,000. And as vacations and traveling became more popular, a roadside business

became more popular. How were Johnson's in the East and McDonald's? One of the great inventions of the era was Disneyland, 1955. Boy, and also motels. Motels were really popular. Holiday Inn was invented. So that's where you would in your car pull right up to the door and unload. So that's all car-centered. The food, the lodging, the driving. It's all centered around the automobile.

“Is there something about the road trip that's uniquely American?”

The fact that we have this idea in America, that we have freedom of the road, that we can at will go and explore. Of course, it was not true for many vacationers. It was not at all true for African American vacationers in this time period. They were severely restricted to travelers from the south who came, came north. Back in the old day, when door comes, you don't want to be cuddle here at six o'clock.

You want to be on this side of the track. Three or four times a year, I would go back and forth to george. But I knew I went to spoke to stop at night, the buying a gear, so doing a thing, not even to use the bathroom. Black people had to stay in segregated conditions. Many people are familiar with the green book, which was a guide for African American travelers throughout the south and throughout the nation. It will be a great day for us to suspend this publication.

For then we can go wherever we please and without embarrassment. But until that time comes, we shall continue to publish this information for your convenience each year. But segregation while it was legal in the south, it was practiced in other places in the country. You would find segregated restaurants and hotels throughout the nation. And most prominently in Washington, D.C., were many people wanted to take their children. And those barriers

began to be broken by veterans. African American veterans who had served in World War II and the NAACP, you know, had 400,000 members by then and people began to write in and the NAACP began to file suit. It was a very different experience for those travelers. It's the shameful history. So we have kind of this golden age of the road trip, you know, when did that change? When did we stop doing that? I think it hit its peak in the 60s in terms of road travel.

I think competition from airlines and an increased push to travel overseas. The heart stopped at where I and my study is in 1973 with the Arab oil embargo. The immediate shortage will affect the lives of each and every one of us. In our factories, our cars, our homes, our offices, we will have to use less fuel and we are accustomed to using. And I think, of course, this has echoes of today. When gasoline is hard to get and oil prices go up,

as the primary vacation was kind of waning and there began to be these couples getaways.

So the tenor of the vacation changed in terms of promotion and these vacations were promoted by the oil companies and the auto companies and the sales of cars and we don't have that dominant and auto industry like we did in the 50s and 60s. As families change, vacations change, families are smaller. Today women have jobs that they didn't in those days. So vacations are

“probably shorter. So time is more precious, I think. But on the other hand, people can work”

while they're in vacation which is probably not a great idea, but they can. I think why people of vacation remains much the same. They want to learn about their country.

They want to show their children the country. It's also a great way to spend money and come home

and brag about it. Back in the day, they were show slides. Now we just put up on Instagram. How many people do you know we're putting vacation shots on Instagram, right? Oh, everybody, I'm going to do it. Sure. Sure. So it's a way of asserting your own status and so way of showing your wealth and what you what you can do and your experiences. So I think being together with the people that you love and just exploring.

You get to swim at a swimming pool. You get to eat fast food. Fun, it's a change from the routine.

“And that's what vacations have always been a change from the routine.”

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All right, I want you to do something for us and that's define a staycation. So it's taking the time to spend in your community or nearby to do things you normally wouldn't do in your regular life and put on hold all of the burdensome things that you would do in your daily life and just go out and have fun and be a tourist like in your own city. My personal favorite is going to hike. It could be a long shore, a little trail, or just a

fun adventure to get outside and spend time at the nature. Another idea adds to extra flavor to

dinner, order a cuisine you've never tried, but to me, you're staying at home. Also, you're not

like going to a hotel anywhere nearby. I just pay my rent. So this weekend, I will be enjoying every wall in this apartment. Every room will be enjoyed. And you're enabling yourself to discover something that you might have taken for granted. So it's not this entire new atmosphere, but it's a new look at a familiar atmosphere. And that is really fun and rewarding while also being budget friendly and hopefully allowing you to maybe put money aside for the

bigger trip that you want to take some time. I discovered a wonderful way to have a full vacation

in one day last year when I decided that me and my kids would take public transit to visit their

dad in Monterrey. And it took a grand total of 12 hours. We took the bus, the smart train, the ferry, most of the rides were free for my kids because they're under 18. It was incredibly

“affordable and it was a lot of fun. I think that the way to really get into the staycation zone”

is planning and preparing and getting yourself hyped for what you're going to do, which is like reading reviews for places that you might want to go. If you've picked a restaurant, look at the menu and like start to drill over what you're going to eat, think about your favorite bookstores

or paths or discover a new corner of your neighborhood that you want to explore. Like in advance,

start doing that as soon as you decide to stay and as soon as you decide what you're going to do, start to plan the trip and then the anticipation of that experience will give you like that vacation high. And I think all of that helps you to stay in the vacation zone and also like make the most of your time and not think about all the things that would be distracting you and annoying you just when you're home doing your boring tasks. It's so hard though because you're around the house,

how do you romanticize your home? How do you make it feel like okay, let's turn this into a hotel or pretend that I do not need to actually clean out that pantry even though I know I do. How do you

“make your home for a little more special? I think we all got too much practice on this during the pandemic,”

but there are a lot of things you can do to kind of change the vibe of your house. If you're not afraid of candles or sense, just like a candle that reflects one of your favorite places, like I have a candle that is like national park-cented, so it's like piney. In my house we do a lot of like audio setting the mood. I have small kids, so we'll play like a ride, audio override at Disney World or just ambient sound from a park that we like or will live stream.

During the pandemic my husband and I meant to spend our anniversary at the beach where we got married, but I was pregnant we couldn't travel, so we found a webcam that showed the sunset on that beach and we got to take out and we just it was really sad but we watched the sunset. Yeah it's sad but it's also

“like quite sweet. It's like it was we'll bring the beach exactly and it was a beautiful sunset. I think”

for me one of the challenges of a staycation and kind of all vacations if I'm honest is not letting real life creep in and beyond like taking time to do administrative tasks around the house but work like I don't know that's like goes off I get that email, a news alert goes out and I'm just like well what if I just take a little gander how do you keep from letting that happen? Yeah unplugging is so hard you could have a couple of small kids and teach them to tell you to

like locks your phone for you so the discipline is real there takes works to like force yourself

“out of that constant need for like scrolling through TikTok or just seeing what's up at work you”

don't you know if you're off you don't need to be on there if there's an emergency they know how to

reach you at work so like trust that process just be super in the moment super present with

whatever you're doing because you need that mental break even if you're not gone somewhere you know

“you like you need to make the most of the time that you have especially if you're taking vacation”

time and spending it at home like vacation time is a precious resource that you should be

using to the best of your ability.

“That's it for this week. Next week I'll be using my vacation to the best of my ability but”

fret not we've been working really hard and have new episodes coming your way. Speaking of we'd love to know what you want us to explain. Call in with your questions and ideas to 1-800-618-855-855 or email [email protected] and you know what makes a vacation even better listening to this podcast ad-free with a Vox membership for more info head on over to vox.com/members. This episode was produced by Denise Geda. It was edited by Jenny Lotton,

fact checked by Melissa Hirsch, an engineer by David Tattachore, our executive producer is Miranda Kennedy and I'm your host John Blunhill. Thank you so much for listening. I'll talk to you soon. Bye! [Music]