Free entry shifts the cost onto people who do not visit

The argument

A second argument offered for this position is about who pays. If admission is free, proponents point out, the cost does not disappear; it is met from general revenue, which is raised from everyone. The people who then use the museum are not a random sample of everyone. Museum visitors tend to be those with the time, the education and the inclination to go, and on this account free entry asks the general population to subsidise an activity enjoyed disproportionately by people who are already comfortable, including visitors from elsewhere who contribute nothing to that revenue at all. The argument is that charging at the door aligns payment with use, which is how a good deal of public provision outside the core services is handled. A fee is not a judgement about the value of museums; it is a judgement about who should bear their cost. Proponents argue that a household that never visits a gallery has a reasonable complaint about paying for one, and that this complaint is strongest precisely where public funds are tight and the competing claims are things like housing, transport and care. Holders of the view are usually willing to make the position more precise under pressure, and they regard the refinement as a strength rather than a retreat. What they defend is a charge with concessions: free or reduced entry for those for whom the fee is a real barrier, and a full charge for those for whom it is not. On this account the objection about exclusion is answered by targeting rather than by making entry free for everybody, and the resulting arrangement asks the people who benefit, and can pay, to fund the institution they use.

Premises

Counter-arguments

Opponents argue that the logic would dismantle most public provision. Parks, libraries, broadcasting and public squares are all used unevenly and funded from general revenue, because their value is held to extend beyond the people who happen to use them on a given day. They also dispute the characterisation of the benefit: a population educated in its own history and holdings is taken to be a general good rather than a private consumption. Others note that concessions require means testing, which is administratively costly and itself deters the people it is meant to help.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P2] Uneven use is true of parks, libraries and broadcasting as well, and is not usually taken to show that those should be charged for at the point of use. [Rejecting P3] The benefit of a well used public collection is not confined to the person in the gallery, so aligning payment with attendance misdescribes who gains. [Rejecting C] Concessions require means testing, which carries administrative cost and deters some of the very people the concession is designed to reach.