Travel to or within the U.S. grew 3.8 percent year over year in August, according to the U.S. Travel Association's Travel Trends Index. Growth for each domestic business travel and domestic leisure travel accelerated, supported by strong consumer spending and consumer confidence that reached heights last seen in 2000. "Through the first eight months of 2018, domestic leisure and domestic business travel continued to expand and outperformed the first eight months of 2017," said USTA SVP of research David Huether. Domestic business travek grew faster than domestic leisure travel.
USTA forecasts that domestic business travel will continue to outpace leisure, thanks to strong business investment spending, and will grow 3.4 percent year over year for the six months from September 2018 through February 2019. Domestic business travel and domestic leisure travel combined will grow 2.6 percent as consumer spending and a tight labor market push wages up.
International inbound travel rose 1.2 percent year over year in August. USTA expects that growth to decelerate to 0.6 percent for the period from September 2018 through February 2019, due to slowing growth in the global economy.
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