A Yen for the Dollar: Airlines and the Transformation of US-Japanese Tourism, 1947-1977

Abstract

This article examines the transformation of transpacific tourism between the United States and Japan from 1947 to 1977, focusing on the key role that Pan American World Airways, Northwest Orient Airlines, and Japan Airlines played in this development. In the late 1940s, travel was mostly by a small upper class leisure market cruising on ships. Linkages between the air carriers and other factors, including governmental policy, travel organizations, and changes in business and culture influenced the industry. By the 1970s, these elements had reshaped the nature and geography of tourism, into a mass airline tourist market characterized by package tours, special interest trips, and consumer values.