Estimating and interpreting the local economic benefits of visitor spending: an explanation

Research into the economic impacts of visitor spending on host communities has a long history. While such research has been ‘popular’ with, and useful for, tourism policy makers it has also been subject to questioning by some academic authors in terms of relevance, validity and difficulty of understanding. This paper addresses these questions by detailing and discussing the underlying concept and its translation into practice using, as an example, the data collection, analysis, and results from one study. The objective, in addition to giving an exposition to the nonspecialist reader, is to consider key issues involved in conducting and interpreting the findings of such research.