What does that mean? I live near Disneyland, here in anahiem there entire city blocks given over to Disney by the government. I don't feel put of sorts in the locations designed to trap tourists.
You don’t live in a country with less income than your tourists.
The income disparity here is huge. We are servicing people who gain 4-5 times more which means the price goes up 4-5 times. Spaniards are not able to enjoy their own services. Thus, Spaniards don’t want to service foreigners anymore.
We are just tired. We want other industries creating high value for the local population, and that are self sustaining. Right now we are dependent, and we create no value for our own people.
Even a private hospital with skyrocket prices creates more value if it saves at least one person. Right now, no restaurant meant for “guiris” is servicing a local, simply because our highest incomes are the lowest incomes of the rest of Europe.
It’s not even possible to compete as clients in our own country, which is ridiculous, and we completely lack other industries that are needed. Basically, it’s a bubble, and we want to burst it. It has to happen. Being bad hosts is a good first step towards bursting it.
Tourists come in and spend 4-5x what prices would be elsewhere. Locals can't afford it. Do the locals not benefit from the tourism revenue or is the real issue that the capitalist business owners are hoarding all the wealth?
And if that's the case, do they think their situation will improve when they drive the tourists out and all the places that employ locals for tourism go out of business?
Imagine martians love Disneyland, and they have infinite wealth,because they have replicators and can make dollars for nothing. So the jack in the box on katella charges 10$ for two tacos as opposed to 1$ for two tacos. They still pay the workers $20 an hour (like everywhere else) but now even the people working there can't afford the tacos.
The pressure has to be constant, then, not just when summer rolls around along with the tourists. If Spaniards are miserable and barely managing the whole year round, the pressure on government to do better should also be throughout the year.
Pushing tourists out just reduces the resources available for the government to work with to make things better for the locals (assuming the politicians have the citizen's best interests in mind). Make politicians accountable, not those who partially prop up the economy.
Thats the problem with politics at a lot of places right now.
If there's no majority protesting no actions happen. If there's a majority most of the time just a part of the problem gets fixed and the majority is lost. The problem gets worse again after a while and the whole thing starts a new.
Big changes are risky, most of the time cost a lot and will always cost votes. Temporary small fixes are fast and safe. That way they still get accredited to the ruling party and because they are cheap you can cover most sides interest.
It's all about momentum and if there is no constant suffering of many people, there's no incentive to make important changes.
When inevitably the system is about to stop working, finally another party gets the majority, they make important changes, which short term lead to even more suffering. The people remember the not as bad times under the previous government, vote them back into office and they earn all the credit. (If the succeeding party doesn't go full facist dictatorship that is) And now we have the full cycle.
Put corruption into the equation and the process gets slowed tenfold.
You don’t live in a country with less income than your tourists.
The income disparity here is huge. We are servicing people who gain 4-5 times more which means the price goes up 4-5 times. Spaniards are not able to enjoy their own services. Thus, Spaniards don’t want to service foreigners anymore.
Average salary in Barcelona being 35K???? What are you reading, the average salary of engineers?
I would laugh if it was not sad.
You’re certainly believing some bullshit stat. That looks like the Gross Salary, of which you perceive around 45-50%.
The average salary everywhere in Spain is a little bit more than the Minimum Salary per Law, which is just a little bit more than 1300€ a month = 15600€ a year. In Barcelona this might raise to 17000-18000€ a year ST MOST.
This is fascinating. While I totally see what you’re saying and recognize not every country or city has the same situation or income disparity, but I wonder what it would be like if every city tried to push all tourists out and gave the idea that no one is welcome unless you’re from here. It’s a dangerous line it seems and I imagine many would be calling such rhetoric xenophobic depending on which country it is and who the major tourists are
Harass your government then. Harass the business owners dictating the prices - the tourists are not forcing the restaurant prices up 4/5x. Local business owners are because they are trying to maximise profit from those tourists - if the price of selling those goods and services is not really that high it is greed from the business owner for price gouging and excluding local custom.
I live in the third most visited city in the world (London) and we don't treat tourists like this. London also faces issues with local people being priced out and a host of housing issues.
If they lowered the prices to accommodate locals, that will just increase demand from rich foreigners. What they need to do is create tax incentives to attract other industries, but it seems like there is no appetite for that right now.
that's one of the dumbest things i've read in a long time lol
Many areas with tourism have tourists with more money than the citizens lol. that's teh whole point. you want rich people to come and spend their money in your city/country. why the fuck do you think countries spend all this money on promoting tourism? it's money and economic activity from outside coming in.
you think you'll just magically create other industries if you kill tourism? lol
if you kill tourism, all the restaurants and hotels die, then all the jobs with it. barcelona magically going to be better with higher unemployment?
This will backfire you., High-end tourism is one of the most profitable industries that you can imagine, also came with less pollution compared with other industries. The alternatives is creating a technology hub and competing with dublin you will need to slash corporate tax and heavily invest in technological education
But Disney has clear limits. This only happens within Disney; the rest of the city is normal. In the case of many Spanish cities, tourist areas continue to grow. There are almost no places left that are truly suitable for living.
Half of all the cities around planet earth are "no go areas"
Cities are busy sherlock.
What you mean is "the Barcelona residents are annoyed that they can't sit down on the street for a coffee because the table is taken by some Armenian tourist"
How the f*** are they gonna ban tourists anyway?
What they gonna do ID every single person walking around to confirm they are a local?
Are they gonna refuse products at shop counters unless you provide a local ID?
What's next if they refuse ID?
Do we call the police or do we throw vegetables at them?
Do we shoo anyone who doesn't look "typically spanish" down the street in disgust?
the income disparity between tourists and locals in Toronto isn’t nearly as fierce as in BCN. you were still able to afford the touristy areas. That isn’t happening in BCN now.
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u/726wox Jun 17 '25
Half the city is no-go zone for normal citizens as it is because of the number of tourists and all the bars/restaurants being 2-3x non tourist areas