this post was submitted on 27 Dec 2023
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That's just semantics, like businesses being banned from giving a surcharge for using a credit card, but they can give a discount for cash. It amounts to the same thing.
I guess. But either is fine with me. Credit cards have leverage over small businesses who often have tight margins. As for up-charging tourists who visit places in foreign countries, I think of it as a subsidy. If they normalized the entrance fees so that all paid the same, and the total maintenance costs were met-- this may well 'price out' poorer locals. A nicer solution might be income-based, but how would you verify such information at a park entrance?
I also want to add that where I live in California, there are some local attractions that offer discounts to local residents. I really can't understand the fuss.
A lot of places even in the US give discounts to locals. And locals often pay taxes that help support these places. So really it makes sense that locals get a discount, or tourist get a surcharge. However you wanna call it.
Ok, but if they were being even kind of accurate, the numbers aren't akin to a discount. One is equivalent to about one quarter dollar, vs the other being the equivalent of nine dollars. That's gouging, not a locals discount.
It's an apples to oranges comparison, though, since in India there is a much lower local median income than tourist median income. In the US, tourists and locals are likely to have near parity in income. And it's worth putting some perspective on it, that it's US$9 to visit a stunning world famous jewel of India. If someone pays to travel all that way and is complaining about coughing up US$9 then I don't know what to say.