Meanwhile, plans for the city's salvation appear and disappear with the regularity of the tides, but the stakes couldn't be higher: Tourism in Venice generates $2 billion a year in revenue, probably an underestimate because so much business is done off the books. It is, reports the University of Venice's International Center of Studies on the Tourist Economy, "the heart and soul of the Venetian economy—good and bad."
Some people suggest that Venice's wounds are self-inflicted—the sequelae of the drive to wring every last euro, yen, and dollar out of tourism. "They don't want tourists," observes a former resident, "but they want their money. American tourists are best. They spend. Eastern Europeans bring their own food and water. Perhaps they buy a little plastic gondola."
There is talk, always talk (this is Italy) about limiting tourists, taxing tourists, imploring them to avoid the high seasons of Easter and Carnival, but tourism—intertwined with the loss of resident population, complica