Find out which are the countries in the world with the largest number of bookstores

If last Monday we knew that Urueña was the town or city with the most bookstores per inhabitant in all of Spain, today we are going to know what the cities worldwide with the most bookstores per inhabitant thanks to the World Cities Culture Report 2014. These cities are Shanghai, Tokyo and Hong Kong.

It is curious that this study has included Madrid in its selection, when the Castilian town of Urueña is the one with the largest number of bookstores in Spain, although this cannot be considered a city and only 20 live there population.

This report also not only focuses on the number of bookstores in a huge number of cities, but also collects data on sixty cultural indicators, among which are museums or cultural events. Below you can see some of the data collected in the report (you can see it in a larger size by clicking on the image).

Focusing in Madrid we discovered that it has four hundred and ninety-seven bookstores, about 16 per 100.000 inhabitants, taking into account that the estimated population of the capital of Spain is 3.166.130 people. Of these it is striking that 32 of them sell second-hand books, something not too usual but that usually enchants the most avid readers or book lovers.

It is very striking that only two cities in the United States appear on the list and that despite what we might think, they cannot boast of having a large number of bookstores. For example, Los Angeles, without going any further, has fewer bookstores than Madrid, in a clear sign that we Spaniards like little to read, but Americans seem to like it even less.

In the following link you can read and download the full report, which consists of several pages full of data, but which is actually worldcitiescultureforum.com