Discretionary
income, or disposable income, is money not needed for personal essentials
such as food, clothing, health-care, transportation, and so forth.
Smaller family size and an increase of women in the labor market
have made today’s family more affluent, which greatly promotes the
tourist industry.
The improvement in transportation
has facilitated
travel on
a large scale. The explosion of railway and automobile
travel was followed by dynamic improvements in air service. Today,
in many countries, elaborate road systems have been built so that
a person can go from border to border or even across national borders
in the case of Europe without being affected by a single red light
or two-way traffic on the same road way. The vast network of roads
and air connections and mass production of the car at a price many
people can afford have led to the development of a tourist industry
unmatched in history. With increasing affluence and leisure, and
a relative decrease in cost travel, the growth of the travel industry
will surely continue. |