Travel expense

“ Expense of Travel.—From what has been said about circular tickets and hotel prices, some notion can be formed as to the general cost of a Spanish expedition. Housing and transportation should not be reckoned at less than six dollars a day ”

“ This expense, however, is most immediately and directly beneficial to those who travel or carry goods from one place to another, and to those who consume such goods. The turnpike tolls in England, and the duties called peages in other countries, lay it altogether upon those two different sets of people, and thereby discharge the general revenue of the society from a very considerable burden. ”

“ Fifteen pounds of luggage are allowed, and twenty-one francs per cent is charged for the overplus. The usual charges for meals to the passengers in the diligence are, for dinner 4 fr.; for supper 31⁄2 fr; for breakfast 31⁄2 fr. The average expense of travelling by the diligence, including the pour-boire of the coachman and conductor, is about 75 centimes per league. They usually travel about two leagues an hour.
Offices in Paris from which the Tours diligences set out.—Rue du Bouloy, Nos 9 and 24—Rue N.-D. des Victoires, No 22. ”

“ The railroad gained nothing from this arrangement except the personal satisfaction of the taxpayer.
Travel expenses in pursuit of business within the meaning of § 23 (a) (1) (A) could arise only when the railroad's business forced the taxpayer to travel and to live temporarily at some place other than Mobile, thereby advancing the interests of the railroad. Business trips are to be identified in relation to business demands and the traveler's business headquarters. The exigencies of business rather than the personal conveniences and necessities of the traveler must be the motivating factors. ”

“ The cost of travelling divides itself into two kinds; direct and indirect: that is, into the outlay which the traveller must reckon on and that which he has to reckon with. The first kind, the necessities, consists of fares, food, lodging, passports, tolls, etc., together with loss by exchange of money or by charges on remittances. The second kind, the possibilities, includes loss by robbery, by war, by disease, lack of legal privileges, ignorance of local custom, and such like eventualities in so far as any one was liable to suffer from them through being a stranger in a strange land. ”

“ This allows for first-class places on all conveyances, and good rooms at good hotels—requires no rigid economy, and permits no extravagance. For a journey around the world, to occupy ten or twelve months, and visiting Japan, China, Siam, Java, India, Egypt, Italy, France, and England, together with the run across the American continent, the cost will be about four or five thousand dollars. But, as before stated, there can be no fixed rule, and the amount of expenditure depends largely upon the tastes and habits of the traveler and the amount of money at his disposal. ”

“ A party of two or more will travel somewhat cheaper than the same number of individuals alone, for the reason that many items are no more for two than for one. Including all the expenses of travel—railways, steamships, hotels, carriages, fees, and the like—an extended journey may be made for ten dollars a day in England and Europe, and twelve dollars for the United States. ”

“ Travel facilities are poor, distances between markets long and much time must be consumed in each city visited, especially in the preliminary trips, all of which increases the cost of the traveller, and for the first few years makes him a rather expensive luxury. ”

“ The average number of miles traveled daily by each man at this season of the year is about fifty, which, if paid for at regular rates, would cost, say, a dollar. Of course one should not ordinarily pay so much to [Pg 306] ride in a box-car as in a passenger-coach, but the ordinary tramp is about as comfortable in one as in the other, and, on the dollar-a-trip basis, he and his 59,999 companions succeed in getting out of the railroad companies sixty thousand dollars' worth of free transportation every day that they all travel. ”

“ You can see, then, that so far as going from America to England is concerned not much expense is involved; $60 to $70 will procure the round-trip passage, which will occupy about sixteen to twenty days. On the other side the travelling expenses with a wheel may be made almost anything the individual chooses to make them. One wheelman will ride from city to city, stopping at large hotels in each city, spending several days there, and going to theatres and places of amusement. ”

“ Cook & Son, Ludgate Circus, and by other tourist-agents. It may be noted here that the ‘pleasure-cruises’ organized by many of the companies offer great attractions at moderate cost, but at the almost entire sacrifice of personal independence, while the fellow-passengers with whom one is associated for weeks may not always be congenial.
As a general rule it is pleasanter and less expensive to travel with one or more companions than alone. Apart from hotel charges and railway and steamboat fares, the cost for two or three persons is often no greater than for one. ”

“ As for the particular fares of stage-coaches, we shall mention them in each journey; only we are to observe here that the expence of baggage is paid apart, and is generally three sols for every pound above fourteen or fifteen pound weight, which is free. With regard to provisions on the road, your safest way, if you travel post, is to know the price of everything before you order it; but with the stage-coach, your meals are generally regulated at fixed prices, as with us; your entertainment is exceeding good, and the whole expence seldom exceeds five or six livres a day. ”

“ Preliminary numbers show that last year, the industry created approximately $545 billion in total travel expenditures and provided $94 billion in tax revenue to local, State, and Federal governments. As one of our Nation's largest employers, travel and tourism supports more than 7 million jobs. ”

“ Guide-books seem to have been from two to four times the price of Baedekers, a minor item, but considerable, like food and lodging. It may seem, at first sight, as if food and lodging were far from minor items, and that truly, of course, if only the total expenditure is considered. But in considering, as is being done here, relative cost only, that is, the cost of travel in so far as it has altered since three centuries ago, it has to be borne in mind that the average cost of food and shelter never alters; it is only standards of living that alter. ”

“ A guide’s fee for taking a person to the summit of Mont Blanc and back, is twenty dollars—and he earns it. The time employed is usually three days, and there is enough early rising in it to make a man far more “healthy and wealthy and wise” than any one man has any right to be. The porter’s fee for the same trip is ten dollars. Several fools—no, I mean several tourists—usually go together, and divide up the expense, and thus make it light; for if only one f—tourist, I mean—went, he would have to have several guides and porters, and that would make the matter costly. ”

“ On the Continent the associations of the third-class carriage are by no means unpleasant—nearly all students and many professional men travel in that way. It is, too, the only way in which to come in contact with the people and study their habits:
First-class traveling may be estimated at about $7 per day in Great Britain, and $6 on the Continent. The items which must be added to the usual hotel expenses and car and carriage rates consist largely of fees to servants in the hotels and restaurants, and to the guards, porters and guides that seem to be essential to each traveler. ”

“ From all this one may conclude that the equivalent of four hundred pounds a year was the minimum for respectable travelling and that the Average Tourist would certainly need at least half as much again. But this is assuming that all who were respectable, or above the need to be so, paid all their own expenses, which was far from being the case. There were plenty of rich travellers who defrayed all charges for a large following. ”

“ The cost to each excursionist varies from $175 to $700, and these figures include first-class transportation, hotel accommodations, carriage drives, lunches and all incidentals. From the time he embarks to the day he returns to New York, the tourist is not obliged to take out an additional cent from his purse. ”

“ They are so high that I consider travelling in America, for an Englishman with his wife or family, to be more expensive than travelling in any part of Europe. First in the list of extras comes that matter of the sitting-room, and by that for a man and his wife the whole first expense is at once doubled. The ordinary charge is five dollars, or one pound a day! A guest intending to stay for two or three weeks at an hotel, or perhaps for one week, may, by agreement, have this charge reduced. ”

“ Stowe, 180; and Bertie, Busbecq, Carmoly, Cobham, Courthop, Dallam, Khitrowo, Moryson, Mundy, Röhricht, Vargas. Contarini, Tommaso; takes peat from Flanders to Italy, 140. [409] Conversation-difficulties; see Linguistics. Coryat, Tom; in Palestine, 232, 329. Cost of Travel in 1600. —— Direct (see Coinage, Fares, Finance, Food, Guides, Licences, Lodging, Luggage, Outfit, Passports, Pilgrimage—Jerusalem, River-travel, Tolls) ; estimates of annual, 314-7; means of economizing, 318-25; foreigners more liable to overcharge then than now, 330; "conducted" travel, 216, 331-2; crossing the Alps, 332-4 ”

“ A tour of ordinary length and duration can now be made through the western nations of Europe, with less expense than is generally believed, as may be inferred from the fact that my entire tour of nearly fourteen thousand miles, cost less than seven hundred dollars. Many travelers lose forty percent of their money by imposition, and others are more careless and extravagant than they ought. ”

“ If one of the number then offers to take them there in his car, it is understood of course that his hospitality extends only to the means of transportation. All procure their tickets beforehand, and the expense of the entertainment at the hotel is divided among them. When one is doubtful on which plan the trip is to be conducted, one should by all means endeavor to pay one’s share. It is best in a case of this sort for a single individual to speak for the rest. ”

“ A modern tourist often finds himself in the position of drawing his income from a locality where money is cheaper or dearer than in the districts where he is making his payments. Now, three hundred years ago, he would have met with these fluctuations more frequently and more suddenly than would be the case to-day; and when met with, they would often have been more violent. In so far as this was the case, so far is the relative cost affected. ”

“ No trader, will however, deny the existence of the evil, as an abstract question. Neither is it denied, that ardent spirits is a tax upon the trade, in the exact ratio of its entire cost, doubled, and trebled, and quadrupled, as this cost is by the expense of interior transportation. ”

“ It is difficult to give a hard-and-fast amount per diem as to expenditure, as it depends so much on the drives, excursions, &c.; as above stated 10 frs. per day paid all hotel expenses (including vin ordinaire) , and we consider that in the spring, with several excursions, and "a landau and four" for the principal drives—such as Bigorre to Luchon, Lourdes to St. Sauveur, St. Sauveur to Gavarnie, &c. &c.—25 frs. or £1 per day ought to cover the whole daily expense of each person. In the summer of course 35 frs., or even 40 frs., would be required for the same period. ”

“ By far the greater number had their money advised at a cost of five to fifteen per cent, usually ten per cent, as against the three-quarters per cent which would probably represent a maximum of loss by exchange to-day to tourists. An unknown quantity lay in the differences of values, which might yield a profit, or might involve heavy loss. ”

“ Increase of expenditure is found in the higher wages bills, in the ever-expanding items of rates and taxes, in the heavier cost of raw materials, in the greater amount of clerical and other work resulting from the sending of frequent small consignments in place of consignments in bulk, and in the provision of greater conveniences and luxuries in travel. ”

“ The usual allowance to commercial travelers for their expenses, exclusive of railway fares, is one pound sterling daily in England, and twenty francs on the continent; and it is probable that the most of them manage to keep within their allowances. ”

“ In pertinent part, this interpretation states that 'Traveling expenses, as ordinarily understood, include railroad fares and meals and lodging. If the trip is undertaken for other than business purposes, the railroad fares are personal expenses and the meals and lodging are living expenses. If the trip is solely on business, the reasonable and necessary traveling expenses, including railroad fares, meals, and lodging, are business expenses. ”

“ Expenses may be roughly set down at five dollars a day, not including railway or other fares, and not including luxuries of any kind. Ordinary hotel expenses will be not far from three dollars a day, leaving two dollars for incidentals. ”