Spain's booming tourism industry boosts GDP, jobs – and resentment

The bright contemporary paintings and dusty antiques at Inaki Gonzalez’s store in this chic seaside city draws upscale tourists seeking the perfect keepsake. But at the entrance, they face a decidedly low-brow message: “Tourist go home” is splashed on the closed shutter of a restaurant in pink paint.

For Mr. Gonzalez, it’s a municipal embarrassment, not to mention a risk to livelihoods in a place that is among the most visited in Spain.

“If I travel somewhere, I wouldn’t want people to treat me like this,” he says. “And if I did get treated like that somewhere, I wouldn’t go back.”

Anti-tourism sentiment