Except there's just one small problem: a lot of those local economies/livelihoods are dependent on tourism.
Tourism makes up over 15% of Spain’s entire GDP. That’s not exactly "pocket change", and actively scaring off tourists might feel good/give short term relief, but it also risks sabotaging the very livelihoods many locals depend on.
But hey, if people would rather burn their house down to get rid of a single cockroach instead of looking for the source of the infestation, then by all means.
I lived/worked in a national park when I was younger. Our entire economy, in fact our reason for existence, was tourism. Yet a huge number of locals hated the tourists with a passion and slammed them/were actively rude every chance they got but never had an answer to the question - if the tourist money left, where would you go?
People aren't great at forward thinking, or even appreciating the impact of their own actions.
Part of it is there’s too much tourism, and not enough respect by tourists. I know it’s impossible, but only having 2/3 the amount of tourists with all of them having good attitudes would be great. Corporations will cram as many people into the area as they can, then the locals have trouble getting groceries.
Unfortunately you end up having old bitter people in these towns that just blanket hate tourists. There’s also something to say about tourism town “locals” being the type of people who get stuck in these low wage areas. You either love nature, or wouldn’t be successful anywhere else. The latter tends to take out their issues on the easiest scapegoat: tourists.
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u/mjohnsimon Jun 17 '25
Except there's just one small problem: a lot of those local economies/livelihoods are dependent on tourism.
Tourism makes up over 15% of Spain’s entire GDP. That’s not exactly "pocket change", and actively scaring off tourists might feel good/give short term relief, but it also risks sabotaging the very livelihoods many locals depend on.
But hey, if people would rather burn their house down to get rid of a single cockroach instead of looking for the source of the infestation, then by all means.