- February 4, 2022
- Posted by: Stratford Team
- Category: Economy
The winter Olympics officially kick off on Friday, with the opening ceremony in Beijing.
This is the second Olympics to take place during COVID and, as was the case in Japan last summer, China decided not to sell any tickets to the games.
Even in non-pandemic times, hosting the Olympics was not exactly a money-maker.
“Overall when we’re talking about economic impact, we have found that there is no positive effect of hosting the Olympic Games,” said Nola Agha, a professor of sport management at the University of San Francisco.
Even when people can travel to the Olympics and buy tickets for events, “we actually find that this influx of tourists that we expect doesn’t make up for the decrease in local economic activity,” Agha added.
So how much does it matter, then, for China to not get any Olympic tourism this time around?
“What they lose from not having spectators and not having tourists is…
