A comparative analysis of leisure and tourism in China and in the USA

Regardless of the similarities or differences between China and the United States, all individuals seek greater happiness in their lives. One can think of happiness as a mental state of well being complimented by pleasant emotions. This study was carried out to perform a comparative analysis of leisure and tourism in China and in the USA. The study was concerned with the time use patterns for work and leisure on a daily, weekly, monthly and yearly basis among individuals from The People’s Republic of China and the United States. Other variables in this study included time use patterns, participation patterns, basic expenditures for leisure activities, basic expenditures for tourism activities, percent of GDP for leisure goods and services, percent of GDP for tourism goods and services, measures of human happiness, measures in economic terms used to promote the tourism industry, frameworks for organizing leisure services, frameworks for organizing tourism services and motivating factors influencing leisure participation. It was found that the People’s Republic of China citizens do not have specific leisure and tourism activities which they have been engaging in but have been copying other tourists’ preferences from mainly the West. Besides, although the values of tourism spending in China may not have been very clear, China spent approximately 2347 billion Yuan on the tourism sector which involves travels for both business and leisure tourism market. In comparison, the United States has traditionally been recording one of the highest GDP percentage usages of leisure goods and services at around 2.8% because of heavy investment in this industry. It was found that most of the spenders in China were mainly domestic tourists who take up about 80% of the tourist population unlike the US, which is comprised, of varied tourists. It was also observed that the organizations of leisure activities in the People’s Republic of China is mostly controlled by states bodies sanctioned by the government to encourage specific leisure activities whereas in or the United States, leisure services industry is advanced, mature and dependent on the individual. To a larger degree, the frameworks for organizing leisure in the US is done by private agencies and organizations which offer individuals various options of leisure activities to take part in. In conclusion, although China performed well in terms of tourism and leisure, the USA did even better because of freedoms allowed by the state powers (free of the strict government censorship China has