Essay Database

Are Art Museums a Public Good? When you approach a museum, even from the outside you begin to enter a realm of possibilities. Most art museums enrich the senses, breech the outer thickness beneath your hard skull and start your mind on a journey that an educated society feels can only better your life experience. But is it a public good? A museum may be a public good in terms that it provides a service …

…because of the free-rider problem where some people want to use the service but feel they should not have to pay for it because they claim it does not benefit them, we probably will never be able to create such an adventure. And what an adventure it would be, priceless paintings, statues in bronze and stone and a little boy from the dark neighborhood sketching from the masters, ideas that will one day, be priceless.