SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO) — For the first time in 20 years the euro and the dollar are equal.
Tuesday the exchange rate became 1 to 1 for the European and American currency; what it means for travelers in tonight’s Your Money Matters.
“It’s been 20 years since the dollar was stronger than the euro,” All About Travel agent Lorie Buus said.
For the past two decades, Americans traveling to Europe have gotten used to things in Europe costing more due to an unfavorable exchange rate.
“You have to sit there and do math and convert it and make sure you’re understanding the exchange rate,” frequent European traveler Sonya Parker said.
Parker is excited her trip to Germany Wednesday will be hitting at the perfect time for the new simplified conversion.
“If anything I’m terrible at math so if it makes it easer for me to do math then that’s fine for me. Very excited for it to be the same amount,” Parker said.
“If you’re already booked, you’re lucky,” Buus said.
Lorie Buus with All About Travel says this new even exchange rate will really help out people who are already planning to travel to Europe this summer.
“Once you’re there, your meals are going to be less, your taxis are going to be less, shopping will be less,” Buus said.
But she says the lower value of the euro won’t help make a trip to Europe more affordable during this incredibly busy travel season.
“The actual cost of going right now, it’s high, it’s very high,” Buus said.
Buus says many of her clients are still making up for missed 2020 trips, so those rebookings combined with all of the pent up demand for more travel has prices of flights and hotels soaring.
“Because the demand is so high and the workforce is so low, your prices are high regardless of what’s happening with the exchange rate,” Buus said.
“People have been traveling to Europe and they have been going in flocks and they were going when the exchange rate was against the dollar anyway,” Parker said. “So I don’t think it will have a big impact on travel.”
Buus says if anything, the lower value of the Euro is just another sign of the economic struggles happening everywhere post covid.
“It’s not just in the U.S.,” Buus said. “If you’re planning your travel to escape it, there’s no escaping, it is everywhere.”
While a dollar will go further on your international travels this summer, increased inflation and economic concerns in the U.S. has more Americans beginning to pull back on spending.
“Even though the exchange is the same, it’s still our dollar that we’re spending,” Buus said.
While Americans may be tightening up their spending, Buus says travel expenses have become more of a priority for people since the pandemic who went nearly two years without spending any money on travel.
