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| Waikiki Beach and Diamond Head Crater (Getty Images/SFGate) |
Summertime is a peak season for Hawaii from June through August. But the month of June is already showing decreasing daily passenger counts compared with 2024, mirroring what many in the Hawaii tourism industry believe will be a slow summer with less travelers and fewer bookings...The visitor decline is somewhat puzzling because the U.S. economy is still strong, and, based upon the stock market's recovery, the negative concerns about tariffs appear to have been overstated. In any case tariffs should have little effect on service industries like tourism.
Hawaii has not reached 10 million visitors again since 2019. As the state worked to regain ground by enticing travelers to come back after COVID-19 and then after the Maui fires, it has been thrown another challenge: a new presidential administration.
In May, the Economic Research Organization at the University of Hawaii released a report forecasting changes to come, citing federal policy shifts as a cause of Hawaii’s declining economic outlook. “International arrivals are already down 3–6%, with double-digit percentage declines in airlift from Japan and Canada,” the report said.
This article is guilty of a lazy analysis. Because no one can definitively say why something is worse, blame politics, which have been polarized for at least 30 years. IMHO, tourism is down because of the escalation in hotel and rental-car costs. I visit Hawaii regularly because I can stay at my parents' house and borrow their car; most potential visitors aren't as lucky as I am.
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