Real spending on tourism, or spending adjusted for inflation, declined at an annual rate of 3.7% in the first quarter of 2008, indicating the travel and recreation industry is being hurt worse than the economy as a whole by declining consumer confidence and rising gas prices, data released Wednesday by the Bureau of Economic Analysis show.


The decline reflected a steep drop in spending on accommodations and passenger air transportation. The BEA also revised its estimates of real spending on tourism for the fourth quarter of 2007 to an increase of 2.3%. By comparison, real gross domestic product grew at an annual rate of 0.9 % (preliminary) in Q1 and 0.6% in Q4 last year.