The Olympics : Is It Worth Hosting?

It is evident that hosting the Olympics games is no walk in the park. The countries trusted with this task have to spend billions to make the games a reality. Some people believe that the countries, even after spending billions of dollars benefit from the games, while others believe that the money can be spent elsewhere more efficiently. To reach a conclusion, one must study all of the different impacts in all of the different sectors the games have.

There is an argument as to whether or not the United States should bid to host the Olympic Games. There are many positive and negative reasons as to help decide whether it will be or not be a good idea. Some positive reasons would be improvements in all types of transport, increase potentially in tourism and business activity. Some of the negative aspects would be potential costs and burdens to the community and an increase in costs and taxes. Many people are going back and forth arguing over this topic. The United States should bid to host the Olympic Games.

London is currently hosting the Olympics this year and in preparation back in 2009 the event was predicted to “provide economic gold at a time of economic need,” however hosting the Olympics is an extremely costly business with the upgrades, new sports facilities, and security that it will cost much, much more than expected.

There are quite a few factors that shaped the modern-day Olympics from 1892 to 2002. Pierre de Coubertin states that he wanted to create the Olympics to spread world peace. He does this by substituting war for friendly sports competitions (doc 1). Of course, there were some bumps in the road while trying to achieve this utopia. Some factors that have changed the Olympics are the allowing of women being able to compete in the Olympics, women’s suffrage, nationalism, wars, and economic conditions (doc 2-7).

In document 5, Japan was in a struggle economically due to world war 2 which put Japan in a large set back. Since the olympic games bring all sorts of foreigners to the country, this helped Japan rebuild and rise to trading due to the money that the foreigners brought with them. Additionally, Japan did not want others to think that just after loss, that they should be seen with “defeated-enemy syndrome,” so they decided to host the olympics to show others that they are doing fine. In addition, in document 7, the author talks about how countries that sponsored the seoul olympics will hinder profits. Korea’s decision to not sponsor was a bad choice because they were giving up economic benefits. Since korea failed to advertise their industrial and economic power, the olympics were not able to help profit

There are many factors in every country that transform the impact of the Olympic Games, but in general, the economic costs outweigh the benefits, while the social impacts are mostly positive. As such, countries in general should not host the Olympic Games for their own national interest, but they should first understand the impacts of the Olympics in relation to their own country before making a final

When a country is selected to host the Olympics, they prepare years in advance for the games. Many times new stadiums, housing complexes, and training facilities are built yet the games will only last a few weeks. Billions of dollars are poured into assembling all the necessary components for this giant event but many people argue that all the money being spent on this event could be used to better the nation. For example, when the Olympics were held in Athens, facilities were built from the ground up and looked amazing while in use. However, after the games ended, the venues were hardly used and were just a burden to the country. As a result, countless Greek citizens criticized the government for their poor use of money. To add insult to injury, the money gained from the games did not equal or surpass the money spent, resulting in more criticism from various people. Same situation with Brazil, many areas inside of this country are populated, poor, and rundown but the national government still decided to host the games. Billions of dollars were spent to ready the country instead of actually helping improve it for

"The Olympics are a wonderful metaphor for world cooperation, the kind of international competition that's wholesome and healthy, an interplay between countries that represents the best in all of us,” said John Williams, the composer for theme music for the Olympics (8). The Olympic Games are international sports festivals that began in ancient Greece. The first ancient Olympics can be traced back to 776 BC when people held this religious festival to honour Zeus, the father of all the Greek gods and goddesses. The participants were male citizens from Greece, and these athletes participated in only one event — foot race. Unfortunately, this ancient Olympics did not last forever. The first olympic in 776 BC in Olympia was an significant event

Initially, to host the Olympic Games, the country must have the money to afford them, but where does it come from? One could say it’s from the public while another says it’s from sponsors. According to “The Guardian” both of these statements are correct, in the 2012 London Games the money came from the central

With over two hundred countries participating, the Olympic Games is easily considered as one of the largest multisport event known to history. The Olympics are held at a different country, and even more rarely at the same city. For a country to be chosen to host the Olympics, the country’s National Olympic Committee (the country’s representatives for the Olympics) nominates a city (from the country they represent) that they think has potential in hosting the Olympics nine years prior to when they wish to host the Olympics. It is a two year process that consists of: Application Phase, Candidate Phase and the Election of the Host City. The country that wins the election is given seven years to prepare for the Olympics. (International

The Olympic Games are a set of friendly competitions that bring countries from all around the world together, but many social, political, and economic problems in the past and present including racial and sexual discrimination and apartheid have prevented the Olympic Games from fulfilling their promise to bring countries together.

Higham (1999) discusses that there are numerous problems, which will be evaluated with hosting an Olympic games such as, development issues, local resident issues, short-term affects, and security issues. In terms of development issues, there is a significant cost dealing with large scale sporting events, and economic benefits are generally received more by big time business interests not the host community. So the host community doesn’t benefit as much as they potentially could by hosting the

 The Games are held every four years in a different city and in 2012 London will be hosting the Games. London hosted the Olympic games previously in 1908 and 1948 and the upcoming games will make London the only city in the world to have hosted the Games three times.

The Olympics have come up with a problem and need a solution fast. The problem is whether the Olympics should have a permanent home or even multiple homes. Or should they stay the same where any country can host the Olympics? Before answering the question think of where and why the Olympics started. Ancient Greece is the birthplace of Olympics about 800 BC and they were later revived in the late 19th century. The first modern Olympics were in 1896 in Athen with 280 participants from 13 nations in 43 events. “The purpose of the modern Olympic Games is to promote peace and unity within the international community through the medium of sports”(reference.com). This quote is exactly right, permanent home deprives countries the chance to show national pride. There are other bonuses to not having permanent homes. It can help a failing country's economy become better and allows them to make history beyond sports. However permanent homes reduce cost of new facilities and it will reduce facilities being abandoned after the games.But in the end hosting the Olympics in different countries allows them to show pride, make history and boost economies, even with the expensive cost.

For instance, the 2002 Salt Lake City Winter Olympics were able to turn a profit. The Salt Lake Organizing Committee (SLOC), had to make last minute extensions to security measures in the wake of the September 11 attacks. The security force for the games consisted of 12,000 people. Regardless of this unexpected last-minute expense of $500 million USD, the U.S. was able to profit by $101 million USD from the games. This is in part due to the fact that only three out of the fifteen venues used for the games were not already built. This means that the SLOC was able to cut down on their overall costs. The games were broadcast to over 2.1 billion television viewers in 160 nations worldwide. The attendance averaged 70,000 people each day at the fifteen venues as 1.5 million tickets were sold. Each of the fifteen venues used in the games are still in use today. These statistics show that the SLOC was very successful in their approach. Since a lot of capital was invested in security, people were able to feel safe at the games and as a result, ticket sales met expected targets in spite of the September 11 attacks. In another example, China was able to make unprecedented revenues from their 2008 Olympic Games held in Beijing. Their Olympic games cost a never-before-seen total of 19 billion Chinese yuan, which was the equivalent to $44 billion