United States Needs to Rethink How It Treats International Guests

When President Obama presented Friday to the International Olympic Committee, the Pakistani representative asked him how the United States would make international visitors feel more welcomed. President Obama admitted that we need to do better.

Our shabby treatment of international guests has cost us more than the 2016 Summer Olympic Games. It costs us billions of dollars of lost business each year.

U.S. companies that make large machinery complain that their overseas competition gets business from those unwilling to be subject to the harsh U.S. visa procedures or rude treatment upon arrival at our borders. When buyers from overseas face difficulty coming here, U.S. companies must travel abroad to get business.

This is no more apparent than the challenges we face producing the nation's largest annual event, the International CES, held each January in Las Vegas. We make our show a world-class event (we were recognized last month by Trade Show Executive as the nation's "most global event"), but our nation's visa policies work against us in attracting the world to our country.

Consider the challenges faced by a Chinese buyer who wants to visit the CES to buy products made by U.S. companies. The buyer must first travel to a Chinese city with a U.S. embassy or consulate. He must wait in line and pay a $131 fee (USD). He must buy a pre-paid phone card to call and schedule an interview and return months later for that interview with his personal financial statements in hand. But to get to that interview he may wait more than two hours in line -- all this for an encounter that could last just five minutes. Afterward, the buyer will be informed whether he will receive a visa.

A U.S. business executive would not suffer this treatment. For a respected and busy Chinese businessman this is more than an annoying process -- it is easier to simply go to our competitor show in Germany. The American embassy staff is hard working and well intentioned but forced to follow arcane and harmful laws.

The result of these policies is that the United States loses out to Europe competitively. European companies pay less to reach buyers. The European economy benefits from the money spent by international visitors. The American economy and American companies lose as international visitors feel unwelcome in America.

Consider also how German political leaders support a German event that CES directly competes with for buyers, exhibitors and attention. Chancellor Angela Merkel and other leaders do everything possible to support the event -- including attending the event itself. In August, I attended the German event and spoke to Chancellor Merkel about her support of major events. She recognized how important they are to the German economy and to facilitating German business.

Contrast that to how American political leaders approach world-class events. For the most part, they simply don't go near them. First, the American ethics laws have become so absurd that many leaders that do attend are barred from eating meals or staying more than a day. Can you imagine how difficult it is to host leaders, including political leaders from other countries, when our own political leaders are effectively barred from attending our events? And our leaders also suffer from not gaining firsthand knowledge of the dynamic technology industry on display.

Indeed, the entire event business has suffered not only because of the economy, but also after unfortunate remarks President Obama made in February about TARP recipients doing business in Orlando and Las Vegas. Both cities subsequently lost several business events as concerned organizers and companies were focused on the "optics" rather than the high value of these locations for doing business.

We can only move forward and learn from the past. We need to look at visiting America through the eyes of our prospective international guests. While maintaining security is paramount, we must learn to distinguish between potential threats and legitimate business people. We need to make the experience more positive -- including signage, comfort and approach from our immigration officials. We need to change the visa laws and other laws regulating government employee travel so our own leaders can help us host international visitors and make them feel welcome.

Moreover, President Obama has the ability to change the tone and extend the welcome mat to international visitors. I urge him to make a high-visibility appearance at a Las Vegas or Orlando trade show (Mr. President, please consider this an invitation to participate in the International CES in January 2010).

Our nation remains the greatest country on the earth. But we need a dose of humility. We have to make people feel welcome if we want them to come here.

Gary Shapiro is the president and CEO of the Consumer Electronics Association.

 

 

Follow Gary Shapiro on Twitter: www.twitter.com/GaryShapiro

Comments

[mlcopines]

Excellent, excellent article and very true. During the last twenty years, I have helped family members and business associates through the ordeal they MUST experience at US consulates abroad in order to obtain a VISA and spend their hard earned money here in the US. These, in most cases, are respected people with upscale socioeconomic backgrounds who have every personal and financial reason to return home. Even the most ignorant can easily see they have much to lose if they remained in the US illegally yet they are treated with disrespect by low level US personnel (two-bit clerks in reality) assigned to the foreign consulates. The most popular misuse of the law by these cretins is referencing section 214 (B) of the immigration code. It essentially says they can deny for no proof of reason at all.

It was not always this way. It most definitely started in the early part of 2000 and I attribute it to both the anti-immigration fervor and the lack of responsibility during the Bush administration to loosen the gates because of 9/11.

As per your reference to President Obama's comment. It is a bit unfair as he clearly spoke of the "heads of companies that receive a federal bailout", not of Las Vegas. I do agree however, it must change and it's now his responsibility to make sure it does.

[fotkin]

They treat everyone at the border like potential terrorists :-( they take fingerprints, they ask very strange questions, they are very very unfriendly! when you stand in line on the border, and they scream at you, when you want to make a phone call. people who work to control the crowd in the line, treat people like garbage. also, when you talk to border people, they mark you with red highlighter, and when you are trying to get to baggage section, they check your blue card, and if it has a red mark, they send you to detention center, where you have to spend couple of hours in the line, and then you go through pretty serious interview, where you are being asked very tricky question, and where you hear in the next rooms people answer very unfriendly question... basically, it's a shame :( my heart rate elevate everything I land in states, and you don't know what to expect from them.

I hope as well that thing will change under Obama administration!

[advancedcinematics]

I myself always feel very unconfortable getting a visa to travel to the USA in my country, Brazil. A have to travel 400 miles from my hometown to Sao Paulo or Rio de Janeiro to get an interview every time and, as a business man, I pass through an humiliation situation during the interviews. I feel myself as an inferior human being. That is a process that makes everyone ashamed. I travel each year to the USA to attend the CES, Cedia, Infocomm etc. and the situation is getting worse every year. Our baggage is scanned with no criterion and openned evey time out of our sight so, from now, I make up my mind to travel always with a simple backpack. That is the truth!

[netzwerg]

My company (not a small mom pop store, but 7 billion € in yearly total revenue) is not sending employees to the US anymore due to stolen laptop computers, arrests without any information for hours, strip searches,... for 5 years now.
Thats lost revenue for the US tourism industry of maybe 150k$, or 45000$ lost tax revenue for the US, or 10000$ for your military-i­ndustral-c­omplex per employee our company has spend elsewhere in the world i.e. China, Russia or Europe.

We make our US business partners now come over to Europe or even China (yes, that evil dark communist country) because they make you feel welcome or we hold conferences over VPN with the american branch.

That said, I travel a lot throughout the world and rather enter Russia or China 100 times, than once the US nowadays. I haven't set a foot on US soil anymore for 5 years now, although I lived there for 2 years at the end of the 90s. Rather meet my friends from that time in Toronto, Canada, but I refuse to give my fingerprints to US’s various secret databases, since I have no criminal record whatsoever.

Maybe things will change in the future, but I have my doubts.