Just do the classic developing country thing and charge non-french people significantly more. 2x the price if you live outside paris, 5x the price if you live outside of France, and 20x the price if you live outside the EU.

Charging EU citizens more than French citizens would be illegal discrimination under EU law. (It might be legal to charge local Parisians less.)

For example see https://brusselssignal.eu/2024/12/ec-demands-end-to-portugal...

I wonder if the Paris city hall can do a rebate program of "Dear Paris residents, mail in your ticket stub and we'll give you a partial refund" - this is a first draft of an idea, it's flawed because it would lead to opportunistic Parisians asking tourists for their ticket stubs, and then telling the city hall that they visited the Louvre 30 times last month.

No, they can't, EU courts would strike that in a heartbeat.

Some time ago Germans tried to tax foreign drivers on their roads, so they introduced toll, nominally for all, but also lowered the same amount another car-related tax that was paid only by Germans. EU bodies saw through the scheme just fine and now they're on hook for returning the toll money to anyone still keeping the invoice/receipt.

Seems worthwhile, nobody will actually keep the receipt

Half yes, probably discarded, but the other half are in company books, because those were accounted as costs of operations. Even then, yes, probably worth it for the time.

There are only charging Germans right now. They wanted to extend that to foreigners, so if you wouldn't lower the tax that pays for this right now, you would charge Germans double.

Of course this is against the interest of other countries, which is why they prevented that, but it wasn't unfair or discrimination.

What's wrong with what I stated?

What is the difference? The key idea still work …

My point is you can make things cheaper for locals. But local means local: it doesn't mean national.

There's a significant ethical issue involved here though. Museums in former colonial nations frequently contain artifacts that were, ironically, stolen from other countries, often through violent means. Charging people from these former colonies to view their own national treasures is deeply problematic.

From the Web-site of the Louvre:

  Admission is free for the following visitors:
  
  Under 18s
  Proof of ID required.
  
  Under 26 year-old residents of the European Economic Area (EU, Norway, Iceland, and Liechtenstein)
  Proof of ID and residency required.

  All visitors
  On the first Friday of the month after 6 p.m. (except in July and August)

(Source: https://www.louvre.fr/en/visit/hours-admission)

Don't forget teachers, and unemployed people.

This is true for every national muséum in France and it is awesome !

> Access by lottery with affordable ticketing would be more democratic than access by riches over others by pricing out working class visitors

Do both. Lottery tickets the day of. Advance-rate tickets at a premium price. Mix and match with a non-EU premium for both.

I don't know about the Louvre, but national amenities usual charge more to tourists. You can rise tourist fares as much as needed. They aren't poor nationals, and it's their number which is causing problems.

You cannot have any different pricing for all EU nationals.

I'm not sure they can legally charge more for other European citizens than French citizens though.

The UK's Natural History Museum is quite instructive. No staff anywhere apart from where money gets taken for food and souvenirs. Free entry to hordes and hordes of children with parents and grandparents in tow.

So how do they manage it?

There is ticket booking, which is done in advance or else there is a queue. Once in, you are just following the same walk as everyone else to see the dinosaurs - what else?!? After the dinosaurs have been seen people can tire themselves out seeing some of the rest of the museum, but most don't see a lot else and head for the gift shop before going home.

At the Louvre they have the slight problem that the hordes are there to see that one painting, the one that isn't exactly massive. Everyone knows exactly what it looks like before taking the pilgrimage. Really they should just get rid of it and put it in on a regional tour indefinitely, so as to share the tourist money elsewhere.

I agree. But not at the cost of the working class workers.