Last night, the United States Olympic Committee (USOC) selected Boston to represent the U.S. in its bid to host the 2024 Summer Games. The Massachusetts capital beat out San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Washington, D.C., and will receive consideration from the International Olympic Committee (IOC) when it makes the next round of decisions in 2016.
For some in D.C., the decision was disappointing. Hosting the Olympics, after all, brings with it an international publicity and spectacle that few other events can match. Along with that comes an influx of tourism, and the prestige of hosting such a high profile event. Organizers behind the D.C. bid billed Washington as the "crossroads of the world," a diverse city "with [c]ulture for [e]veryone" that would do the event justice.
However, others were breathing a collective sigh of relief when the news broke: Olympics-worthy accommodations, transportation, and stadiums don’t come cheaply, and though the Washington metro area has some existing infrastructure that could be used to host the games, the city would still face enormous costs as a host.
In June of last year, NTU Communications Associate Sam Jordan wrote about the cost overruns that have historically plagued host cities. The University of Oxford reviewed every Summer and Winter Olympics held between 1960 and 2012, and studied the difference between the amount each city budgeted and the actual costs incurred. On average, the final price tag was over 324 percent of the expected cost. Based on the $4-6 billion estimate offered by the D.C. 2024 team, that means the actual cost could be as high as $19.44 billion.
NTU’s Andrew Moylan authored another study in 2009 which shows that even as stadium construction costs rise, taxpayers are frequently footing substantial portions of the total bill. An analysis of 53 facilities built between 1990 and 2004 showed a 60 percent increase in average cost. And when stadiums were funded with 50 percent or more in taxpayer subsidies, they were $65 million more expensive on average. It is difficult to believe that the case would be any different for Olympic venues built in or around D.C.
The U.S. also recently made a bid to secure the 2022 World Cup, an event it last hosted in 1994 and required 9 stadiums and $5 million in construction costs. The 2014 edition of that event, in Brazil, cost the government over $3.6 billion in stadium costs alone.