Did you hear about the mayor who wants to make it harder for tourists to visit her city? It isn’t some Trump-supporting nativist in Georgia worried about foreigners. It’s the socialist mayor of Paris.
Mayor Anne Hidalgo announced on Monday she would fine Airbnb millions of dollars for supposedly breaching advertising rules in the French capital. Hidalgo’s action is ill-advised and unjustified. It will only serve to price out groups of tourists, restrict income-earning opportunities for hard-pressed Parisians, and reduce tourism inflows.
Don’t get me wrong, I recognize that not everyone is a fan of Paris in the first place. I’ve personally always thought that the capital city is overrated. It’s dirty, expensive, and in some areas, dangerous. I prefer history to art, so I find Normandy far more impressive — see the Bayeux Tapestry in Normandy. Lyon and Provence in the South of France are also preferable. That said, home to the Arc de Triomphe, Louvre, Notre-Dame cathedral, and Eiffel Tower, everyone should visit Paris at least once. The question then becomes, how?
And that takes us back to Airbnb. Because they offer affordable accommodation for individuals or groups, Airbnb makes visiting Paris more affordable, flexible, and beneficial to the city. Consider that the money earned from each rental goes directly to French individuals. This enables them to spend more and boost their local economies. Well, it would if not for socialism.
As the BBC reports, Hidalgo is now going around telling the media that Airbnb style rentals “spoil some Parisian neighborhoods.” But that’s a joke of an excuse for these fines. Hidalgo is not really concerned about neighborhood conditions. If she cared about that she would be focused on improving economic growth in impoverished suburbs, such as Clichy-sous-Bois. Instead, like any good French socialist, Hidalgo is genuflecting to big union bosses. In this case, the hotel union which despises the fact that Airbnb is offering more, and cheaper, options than its industry. It doesn’t matter to Hidalgo that basic economic theory suggests that more tourists in her city will mean more spending in its economy. That’s what a free market mayor would be focused on. But all that Hidalgo cares about here is constraining competition in service of special interests.
And people wonder why France’s economy is weak.
