Australia Is The Most Popular Country For Vacations — If Cost Is Not An Issue

Every year at this time, The Harris Poll^® asks a representative sample of all adult Americans in which country, outside the United States, they would most like to spend a vacation if cost was not an issue. For the eleventh year in a row, Australia tops the list as the most popular ideal vacation destination. The next most popular countries are Italy (#2), Great Britain (#3), France (#4) and Ireland (#5). It is noteworthy that three of the top five countries are English speaking.

Rounding out the top ten are Germany (#6), Japan (#7), New Zealand (#8), Spain (#9) and Greece (#10).

These are some of the results of a Harris Poll of 2,372 U.S. adults conducted online between June 5 and 11, 2007 by Harris Interactive^®.

There are some changes in the rank order since last year:

• France has moved ahead of Ireland into fourth place;
• Japan moved up from #11 to #7;
• Spain moved up from #12 to #9;
• Canada slipped from #7 to #11;
• Egypt (#14) and China (#15) come onto the list this year, as the Bahamas, Jamaica and Brazil dropped off of it.

Australia is the favorite vacation destination for most demographic groups, but there are some exceptions. Italy is the favorite for Echo Boomers (those aged 18 to 30) and for college graduates without post graduate education. Britain is the favorite of Matures (aged 62 and over) and people with some college education, but not a college degree.

Overall, half of all adults (50%) would choose a European country for a foreign vacation if cost was not an issue (and, of course, Europe is now very expensive for Americans because of the strong Euro and pound and the weak dollar). One-quarter (25%) would choose a country in Asia or the Pacific and one in ten (11%) percent would go to the Caribbean or the Americas.

"If you could spend a vacation in any country in the world, outside the United States, and you would not have to worry about the cost, what one country would you choose?"

Base: All U.S. adults

* Not in top-15.

= Indicates a tie.

Bahamas (was #14), Jamaica and Brazil (both tied for #15).

"If you could spend a vacation in any country in the world, outside the United States, and you would not have to worry about the cost, what one country would you choose?"

Base: All U.S. adults

"If you could spend a vacation in any country in the world, outside the United States, and you would not have to worry about the cost, what one country would you choose?"

Base: All U.S. adults

"If you could spend a vacation in any country in the world, outside the United States, and you would not have to worry about the cost, what one country would you choose?"

Base: All U.S. adults

Note: Percentages may not add up exactly to 100 percent due to rounding.

* Less than 0.5 percent.

This Harris Poll^® was conducted online within the United States between June 5 and 11, 2007 among 2,372 adults, Figures for age, sex, race/ethnicity, education, region and household income were weighted where necessary to bring them into line with their actual proportions in the population. Propensity score weighting was also used to adjust for respondents’ propensity to be online.

All sample surveys and polls, whether or not they use probability sampling, are subject to multiple sources of error which are most often not possible to quantify or estimate, including sampling error, coverage error, error associated with nonresponse, error associated with question wording and response options, and post-survey weighting and adjustments. Therefore, Harris Interactive avoids the words "margin of error" as they are misleading. All that can be calculated are different possible sampling errors with different probabilities for pure, unweighted, random samples with 100% response rates. These are only theoretical because no published polls come close to this ideal.

Respondents for this survey were selected from among those who have agreed to participate in Harris Interactive surveys. The data have been weighted to reflect the composition of the adult population. Because the sample is based on those who agreed to participate in the Harris Interactive panel, no estimates of theoretical sampling error can be calculated.

J 30887

Q800