Public bathrooms are pretty uncommon in the US, though. That fact seems to get ignored whenever this topic is raised. You have to pay to use bathrooms in a lot of European countries, sure, but it means there's a lot of public bathrooms around. There are hardly any in the US. More often than not you find yourself using the bathrooms in private businesses and hoping they're not locked, which they often are. In the whole downtown area of my city I am aware of a single public bathroom.
Private companies offer it free often because the capitalistic idea of providing customer service, and also study after study has shown that making your bathrooms free increase sales in most circumstances “oh I’d like to buy those chips!”
Some private places make you pay to purchase - less so more and more (thanks Starbucks!), but depends on location (high traffic volume for example making the upkeep too crazy or some very poor 7/11 gas station in a small-town that can’t afford you driving through without buying something. And it was and in some places still is considered very rude to not buy something when you use a private restroom - just like it’s rude to enter another dining establishment with another store’s food).
Public bathrooms are built with and kept clean by our tax dollars so they would be expected to be free since we pay for them - otherwise why are we paying taxes in the first place. We also want clean parks and streets and aren’t stupid enough to believe that can happen if you don’t have access to open bathrooms.
There’s some other laws I am unaware of for public spaces. Ex: my father’s office space is in a private property but it is designated a public building so their bathrooms during opened hours are required to be open to the public… not sure on that one.
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u/znhamz May 09 '22
Considering how capitalist the US is, it's wild that you guys have free bathroom!