Having lived in Russia for 6 years now and traveling too many other countries. I realized that I assume that everyone has a passport. I would say that from what I am seeing, 50% of most people in their home country have a international passport. I believe that it is much higher than that figure in Russia…
In fact I see from a CNN article that international passports are at a high of – “Canada’s 60% and the United Kingdom’s 75%” – I think Russians would be in that range also. I know that literally every Russia I know has an internal passport and a international passport. Russians love to travel to other countries to vacation…
The links below are from an article that I found and can not find the link again. I am being blocked from the site for some reason. I can get there by a proxy and since that is the only way to get there, they do not deserve a link from me…
- 25%: “75% of Americans don’t own a passport”
- 22%: “just 22% of Americans own a passport”
- <20%: “less than 20% of all Americans own a passport”
- 15%: “85 percent of Americans do not own a passport”
- 10%: “only 10 percent of US citizens *ever* own a passport”
- <10%: “fewer than 10 percent own a passport”
- 7%: “only seven percent of Americans own a passport”
So even if we take the best of figures, Americans do not have passports to travel outside of but just a few hand picked locations. Very controlled and very limited in world spirit…
Now I would say that from my past experience (6 + years ago) in the US, 80 to 90% of the people do not have a passport to allow them to travel to see the world and the fact that they can travel to Canada, Mexico, Caribbean and several other spots fairly easy, does not count as world travel… 🙂
But I am understanding that there has been a huge increase in applications for a passport in the US and most of that is due to the new regulations coming that make it almost impossible to get a passport…
This might be a more interesting figure if it is true and could be a deciding factor on why they are trying to shut down the ease of getting a passport. The numbers are skyrocketing if this is true…
“Times have changed. “More Americans have passports now than ever before,” says Ken Chavez, spokesperson for the Bureau of Consular Affairs at the US State Department. Over one-third of the population to be exact, or nearly 110 million out of 313 million Americans. That’s more than double the number of US passports in circulation in 2000 (48 million) and around 15 times 1989’s 7 million. At that last number (under 3 percent of Americans), you can sort of understand why my European traveling buddies were scandalized. (Link)”
So it looks like my time away from America has left me clueless and people are getting passports now in America!
Could that be for what is coming as the future unfolds?
(Oh and a hint – when you try to figure out what is true. Do not count a passport card. That is a nothing passport, I am talking about international passports that allow you to travel to many other countries…)
Kyle Keeton
Windows to Russia…
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