Big Government reports that big stadiums aren't the boom claimed by promoters.
My observation is that these big crony-capitalist projects end creating a tiny number of multi-millionaires and a large number of low wage, part time jobs. As for the local community, the big public financed stadiums pull local crowds from smaller local venues; so they don't create widespread prosperity.
This topic has been thoroughly explored in the book Field of Schemes. Authors Neil deMause and Joanna Cagan document the fact that when all is said and done, sports stadiums generally turn a net loss for the economy of the area that is taxed to contribute to them. Sports stadiums don't even break even.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the link. I figured that there would be a great deal of writing on these boondoggles.
ReplyDeleteI admit. This post was nothing but repeat of knowledge that should be repeating.