Buenos Aires: Bookstore-Per-Capita Capital

Shelf Awareness

El Ateneo Grand Splendid bookshop in Buenos Aires.

The AP (via Columbia Daily Tribune) notes that Buenos Aires, Argentina, has 25 bookstores for every 100,000 people, more bookstores per capita than any other major city in the world, according to the World Cities Cultural Forum.

"Books represent us like the tango," Juan Pablo Marciani, manager of El Ateneo Gran Splendid, told the AP. "We have a culture very rooted in print."
Besides the city's cultural tradition, the book world is helped by tax policies: "There are no sales taxes on books, notable in a country where most products get 21% slapped on top of the sticker price," the AP wrote. "And heavy import taxes on books, and electronics such as e-readers, help keep the local printing industry strong. While Argentines are increasingly glued to their mobile devices, customers who want to use foreign retailers such as Amazon have to pay a 35% surcharge on their peso-denominated credit cards."