(UPDATED: January 6, 2011)

A Brit I met recently expressed her shock that an American she knew did not have a passport. “Is this normal,” she asked, “do most Americans not have passports?”

“Good question, and an even better topic to discuss on the site,” I thought to myself as my mind wandered from the conversation at hand and to the site (as what usually happens when I talk to people).

The quick answer is: Yes, most Americans do not have a passport. The number of Americans who have a passport, according to the most recent statistics issued by the State Department in January of 2011, is 114,464,041.

Given the country’s population of 307,006,550, about 37% of the population has one. This means that nearly 2 out of 3 Americans can’t even fly to Canada, let alone travel to anywhere else in the world (new rules allow those with “Passport Cards” to travel to Canada, Mexico and the Caribbean and Bermuda, but they are not allowed to be used for international air travel. There are about 3.5 million Americans who have this card.)

So has this number been going up or down in the last few years?

According to the statistics, 2010 was basically on par with 2009 and 2006 levels, both of which were far below the 2007 and 2008 levels (due to stricter air travel requirements as mentioned above), but still nearly double from what they were as recently as 2003 (7.3 million in 2003 to last year’s 12.3 million passports issued.)

Believe me, I’m the last person to defend anyone who doesn’t have a passport, but rather than saying why I think this is bad (which is essentially what I am trying to do every day on this site), I thought I’d take a look at some reasons why perhaps this is.

Money

One is cost. As Katy of the Missourian points out, given the average income and costs associated with raising kids for the average American, and given the costs of traveling abroad, even the cheapest trip abroad would essentially bankrupt a typical family (check out her financial breakdown here).

Culture

No doubt Americans just don’t have the history and drive that, say, the British have for international travel. Simon Winchester in the 2009 edition of “The Best American Travel Writing” has this to say on that subject:

There was essentially no empire (the Philippines, Puerto Rico, and a scattering of Pacific islands excepted), and hence little by way of imperial legacy. The country is formidably isolated by thousands of miles of ocean from almost anywhere truly foreign, and getting abroad is very much more costly. Americans seldom went to seek their fortunes overseas, as British so often did . . . [and there] is little tradition of American exploration (aside from exploration-as-entertainment put on for the benefit of a number of some rather dubious but fashionable clubs and societies).

Maybe It’s Not That Bad

It’s also worth pointing out that although some places like the U.K. are just teeming with passports (71% of the population at last count), at least Americans aren’t as bad in this respect compared to, say, the Chinese, whose 20 million passport holders make up a measly 1.5% of the population. Also, Americans come respectfully third in the number of international departures, behind Germany and the United Kingdom (of course this is a little skewed given population numbers).

Posted on February 17, 2010 by Matt Stabile