That is a large part of it, but it's not all of it. While it's a legitimate service to provide food and lodging to travelers–even if those travelers happen to b

That is a large part of it, but it's not all of it. While it's a legitimate service to provide food and lodging to travelers–even if those travelers happen to be there primarily to see your cultural offerings–it bothers me that there are services directed towards showing them off pseudo-educationally. It's... you learn enough to think you've learned something, when all you've really learned is a superficial, well-packaged veneer. If the point is to have something to do while being on vacation, that's fine... but why pretend? It doesn't really help that things are often designed to be entertainment. Is it really a good thing to put your culture on as a show? Sure, there's satire, but satire isn't satire when the audience doesn't actually know what you're satirizing. (Also, isn't the income differential a fundamental part of a tourism economy? I mean, in Seattle's Pioneer Square, we've got random little gold mining shops and see-the-underground tours, which I'm also uneasy with... but that's not a tourism economy. I'd estimate a good 50% of people who work in this neighborhood are in tech; others are nightclub stuff; and a noted above-average complement of food people; etc. There's a tourism industry here, yes, but it's not a tourism economy.) Like I said, it's more feeling than reasoning.