menachem

"I would guess tourism is a major source of income for most cities including Paris and Barcelona. Take away tourist and hotels, restaurants, attractions and shops all lose money. How many locals stay in a hotel or visit the major sights? It's a double edged sword."

There's been research into the net result of tourism to Amsterdam: conclusion: it's negative, because the bulk of revenue is syphoned away abroad where multinational businesses like hotel chains have their offices. Meanwhile the viable commercial infrastructure of Amsterdam is being undermined: so small independent business owners like greengrocers or butchers or ironmongers, what have you, that cater to the local population get bought out if they're in prime locations. Those shops will be replaced by icecream/crepe/nutella shops that cater to the munchies of tourists.

menachem

Airbnb's most formidable enemy ISN'T people who are worried about housing imo.

In Amsterdam, rent controlled housing is off the market in a major way because of short lets, and waiting times for an apartment for an average Amsterdam inhabitant is now WELL OVER TEN YEARS. That is simply not sustainable for a city!

cheska15

Every country seems to have the affordable housing problem. Here in Australia baby boomers with money to invest are getting the blame.

Countries( eg Governments) cannot have it both ways. You either have Tourists and who are cashed up ready to spend or you don't. However just because you are a cashed up tourist doesn't excuse bad behaviour.

Someone commented on the money going to off shore multinationals. Well those multinationals are still creating jobs for locals.

One article I read last year said that after the attacks in Paris tourism dropped by 35%. I am not sure if this was true. That is a big hole for those working in the industry.

My view is that Governments and those who make money from the tourism industry want the pros and will ignore the downside.

bvlenci

<i> So, ban tourists because they take over the cities. Yet without them, the same businesses that complain, would close </i>

This assumes that the tourist business owners are the ones complaining. Instead, they're the ones who put a stop to any realistic measures to manage tourism.

menachem

Someone commented on the money going to off shore multinationals. Well those multinationals are still creating jobs for locals.

That was me. The positive influence of hotels and such on local employment rates also turned out to be negligible in the case of Amsterdam. Rather, there was a negative influence on employment, because of the disappearance of independent small businesses from the city.

menachem

bvlenci, exactly. In Amsterdam it was booking.com, headquartered there, that lobbied the city gov with reports on net profits from tourism. Turns out they counted themselves as the "tourism industry" in Amsterdam and so added their profits to the plus side of that balance sheet. To date, their staff number about 30 people, mostly from other EU countries and India.

kerouac

<i>One article I read last year said that after the attacks in Paris tourism dropped by 35%. I am not sure if this was true. That is a big hole for those working in the industry.</i>

Definitely not true, but certain nationalities dropped by 35%, notably Japanese tourists. The overall drop was 10%. This year Japanese tourism is up 60% and Chinese tourism is up 40%. This year the only tourism to Paris that is down a bit is from the United Kingdom, for self-inflicted reasons.

However, keep in mind that the tourist industry represents only 6% of the economy in France as a whole and about 10% in Paris.

PatrickLondon

Some recent pieces in the Guardian on some of these points:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...turation-point

https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...terror-attacks

vincenzo32951

>>However, keep in mind that the tourist industry represents only 6% of the economy in France as a whole and about 10% in Paris.<<

10% sounds like a lot to me. Don't hold me to this, but I think I read somewhere that it makes up about 5% of NYC's economy -- and NYC gets **a lot** of tourists. Would welcome someone's hard statistics on NYC tourism.

AJPeabody

So, presciently, Yogi Berra summarized the whole thing: "No one goes there anymore. It's too crowded."

vincenzo32951

Yogi said that after visiting Venice.

massimop

menachem has said some of this already but I do think people need to step back and see the larger picture.

The economic system 99 percent of the globe has adopted opens the door wide to people seeking to make money by any means necessary. The tourist 'industry' -- which is not the same as tourists, far from it -- has no other motive than profit making. It will maximise profit at the expense of public interest every single time unless those serving the public interest step in to regulate & restrain on behalf of the public.

You only get citizens protesting when the public sector is so weak or compromised that it is no longer serving the public interest. It is very typical of history for politicians to deflect blame for their failings to "those people". So it's not government officials, bribed by corporations, who de-industrialised the country & let your good paying job escape off-shore. It's immigrants.

It's not government officials, bribed by the tourist industry, who flooded your town with tourists to the point of unlivability -- it's tourists themselves.

As we all know, the normal reaction of human beings to meeting people from distant lands & cultures is one of great curiosity & hospitality. However, when the tourist industry has been allowed to jam more & more foreigners into a community at the expense of the community, of course the community -- who gets no benefit from this is angry. While the corporate headquarters are far away, the tourists are in your face every day, and the bad behaviour of a very few foreigners is singled out and portrayed as representative of the whole tourist population.

People need to realise that as long as they put up with an economic system that is dominated & controlled 99 percent by the profit-seekers, who have the money to buy off all the "public servants", community will be the loser 99 percent of the time. In your community it might not come in the form of tourists. It will come in the form of devastated schools, or flooded cities, widespread joblessness or opioid addiction, no access to health care, etc.

Unless the public sector is made the master of the profit-seekers, and the public good is asserted to be more important than a mountain of wealth in the hands of the few, every place you love will be ruined.

menachem

what massimop says.

vincenzo32951

Well, I do, too, sort of. Except for the fact that, in other than totalitarian states, you get the government you elected. Your best "protest" is made at the voting booth.

menachem

vincenzo32951 that's true up to a point of course: again, in Amsterdam, any city government is always a coalition and there's always a number of issues that people will vote on. For instance, in the last municipal elections, freehold tariffs for homeowners were a big, divisive issue and the motivation behind many people's votes. A position on tourism is only a small part of the issues that people vote on. Amsterdam does have a life (just) beyond tourism and the interests of tourists. In Amsterdam's case, the policy always was to really market the city to higher income, "cultural" tourists to steer the city away from the stag parties and the weed smokers and prostitute gawkers. And then AirBnB happened, a completely new phenomenon for which no legal framework and no policy exists as of yet.

I think it's a bit disingenuous of you to suggest that Amsterdam inhabitants have brought this upon themselves for not voting smarter.

raincitygirl

Good points menachem.

And oh my gosh I totally agree with massimop's remarks above.

massimop

The voters in the West have rebelled quite dramatically against their lack of meaningful choices at the ballot box, and the irresponsible behavior of professional politicians has left the door wide open for demagogues & delusional egomaniacs to exploit an honest need for change & grab power fpr themselves & their cronies. People will not repeatedly vote for the people & systems that betrayed them & left them worse off than before. One cannot seriously expect that. It's not realistic. Voters, human beings, repeatedly betrayed will either walk away, despite the uncertainties, or vote for whomever promises a return to "community" -- and the easiest community to call into being is always "us, not them".

I'm 100% committed to the ballot box as the best vehicle for social change & improving the lives of the many. But there is no point in voting for politicians whose mistakes landed us where we are & whose program for the future is "more of the same, only more of it".

PatrickLondon

This upcoming BBC radio programme might be of interest:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b092mbhf

Whathello

These people who don't want tourists in their hometown don't visit any other place I suppose ?

ribeirasacra

https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Euro...and-resentment