Chile Gets a Visitor

In case you missed it in the news today, Chile has a visitor.

Photo Source: http://www.latimes.com/media/photo/2011-03/60301814.jpg 

There are probably many things I could write about this (nuclear power, economic trade, the U.S. relationship with Latin America, etc) but I'm going to be self-centered and skip to the thing that might effect me personally.


The Visa Waiver Program.


The Visa Waiver Program, or the VWP as we like to call it, is the group of countries whose citizens get to enter the United States for business or pleasure up to 90 days without needing a visa. Currently, Chile is not on that list. But it could be! With Andrés obtaining his visa (on his second try) last fall, we definitely learned how sucky and expensive it is to not have your country on that list. And as I was researching it today, I came across this travel organization that has been petitioning Obama to add Chile, Brazil and Argentina to the VWP while he's visiting Latin America. A lot of people think that he's going to do it soon. And I hope he does. It could be the one good gift that he could give to me during his presidency, hehe.


And seriously, it would be good for the economy. From what I could piece together, before the restrictions that followed September 11th Chileans were allowed to travel to the U.S. without a visa. In this article it shows the economic impact of that:

US arrivals from Chile to the US totalled 127,000 in 2009, down 34 per cent from 2000, while during the same timeframe, total outbound long-haul travel from Chile to other countries increased more than 50 per cent. 

Chilean travellers each spent an average of $4,600 during a US trip in 2009 and directly generated a total of $580 million which supported 5,300 US jobs.

So because they have to go through the process of applying for a tourist visa in order to come to the United States, Chileans have been going elsewhere on vacation and supporting other countries' tourist economies. I say, let's open the doors of tourism and business to Chile!


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Side note: As I was thinking about Obama visiting Chile, I had a random question... Where will the first family sleep? In la Moneda (Chile's presidential palace, although Andrés told me it's not like the White House- President Piñera does not live there, he just works there), a fancy hotel, Air Force One??? Such an important question and yet I cannot find the answer by googling it!