{"id":51055,"date":"2017-05-26T18:00:50","date_gmt":"2017-05-27T01:00:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/?p=51055"},"modified":"2017-05-26T19:04:14","modified_gmt":"2017-05-27T02:04:14","slug":"rio-olympic-infrastructure-left-in-economic-chaos-was-it-worth-the-gamble","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/rio-olympic-infrastructure-left-in-economic-chaos-was-it-worth-the-gamble\/","title":{"rendered":"Rio Olympic Infrastructure Left in Economic Chaos, Was It Worth the Gamble?"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Olympics no longer have the upper hand in determining where its summer and winter games will be contested. That’s because the international sporting competitions have left a path of destruction, both in a financial and infrastructural sense, in recent decades.<\/p>\n

\"Olympics
It was just nine months ago that Michael Phelps capped off his storied Olympics career inside the Aquatics Center in\u00a0Rio de Janeiro. Built for the 2016 Summer Games at a cost of $38 million, today it sits vacant deteriorating. (Image: Mario Tama\/Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Cities are finally wising up that the gamble on hosting the Olympics far outweighs the potential reward. The chances of a country striking it rich from hosting the quadrennial summer or winter spectacle are about as likely as a casino gambler hitting that progressive slots jackpot.<\/p>\n

Case in point: Rio de Janeiro<\/a>. Brazil’s\u00a02016 Olympics price tag was\u00a0over $12 billion, and what it got in return for its sizable investment is a cluster of abandoned stadiums and venues that are expected to cost the country millions of dollars in maintenance each year.<\/p>\n

Two of the stadiums constructed for the 2016 games were earmarked for future use. One was to be renovated into a school, but today remains boarded up. Another, an outside stadium that hosted rugby and the modern pentathlon, was scheduled to be transformed into a public park. It also remains vacant, and trash and debris from the Olympics is still littered throughout the venue.<\/p>\n

Good for Gambling, Bad for City<\/b><\/h2>\n

One area that does benefit from hosting\u00a0an Olympics is the gambling industry. When London welcomed\u00a0the 2012 Summer Games, UK sportsbooks<\/a> took in over $100 million in bets. Four years earlier in Beijing, the same oddsmakers generated a handle that barely eclipsed $5 million.<\/p>\n

Brazil tried to pass gaming laws prior to its Olympics hosting, but failed. Legalization talks continue today in an effort to find new forms of tax revenue. Las Vegas Sands billionaire Sheldon Adelson is once such mogul who is reportedly interested in building in Rio should the market become liberalized.<\/p>\n

\n

Japan won’t be making the same mistakes as Brazil. Its National Diet passed an integrated resorts bill to end commercial gambling prohibition in December, and the expected two casinos could be ready in time for the 2020 Summer Games in Tokyo.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Few Suitors Remain<\/b><\/h2>\n

While the 2016 Olympics avoided complete catastrophe, it was certainly a scandal-riddled two weeks in South America. Inadequately built venues and athlete housing, sanitary issues, concerns over crime, the Zika virus, and more plagued the games.<\/p>\n

The International Olympic Committee can cross South America off its list, leaving Africa as the only inhabitable continent not to host an Olympics. But it\u00a0will likely stay that way for decades to come due to the ever-growing cost\u00a0surrounding the Games.<\/p>\n

Los Angeles and Paris are the two finalists for the 2024 Summer Olympics after Budapest, Rome, and Hamburg\u00a0all withdrew their bids.<\/p>\n

Bottom Line<\/b><\/h2>\n

Oxford University recently compiled data on what it takes to host the Olympics. With costs adjusted for inflation, from 1960 through Sochi in 2014, the average price was $5.2 billion for the Summer Games, and $2 billion for the Winter Games.<\/p>\n

\n

Top 5\u00a0Offenders<\/i><\/strong><\/p>\n

Sochi (2014, Winter) $21.9 billion<\/p>\n

London (2012, Summer) $15 billion<\/p>\n

Rio (2016, Summer) $12 billion<\/p>\n

Barcelona (1992, Summer) $10 billion<\/p>\n

Beijing (2008, Summer) $7 billion<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Olympics no longer have the upper hand in determining where its summer and winter games will be contested. That’s because the international sporting competitions have left a path of destruction, both in a financial and infrastructural sense, in recent decades. Cities are finally wising up that the gamble on hosting the Olympics far outweighs […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":42,"featured_media":51059,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,61,16,1074],"tags":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nRio Olympic Infrastructure Left in Economic Chaos, Was It Worth the Gamble?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The Rio Olympics may have been a bad bet for the South American city, which now has disastrous consequences from the games.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Rio Olympic Infrastructure Left in Economic Chaos, Was It Worth the Gamble?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The Rio Olympics may have been a bad bet for the South American city, which now has disastrous consequences from the games.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/rio-olympic-infrastructure-left-in-economic-chaos-was-it-worth-the-gamble\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Casino.org\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/Casino.OrgNews\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2017-05-27T01:00:50+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2017-05-27T02:04:14+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/58d131891d0000f42c7cf8e5.jpeg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"400\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Casino.org Staff Writer\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@Casino_Org\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@Casino_Org\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Casino.org Staff Writer\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/rio-olympic-infrastructure-left-in-economic-chaos-was-it-worth-the-gamble\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/rio-olympic-infrastructure-left-in-economic-chaos-was-it-worth-the-gamble\/\",\"name\":\"Rio Olympic Infrastructure Left in Economic Chaos, Was It Worth the Gamble?\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/rio-olympic-infrastructure-left-in-economic-chaos-was-it-worth-the-gamble\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/rio-olympic-infrastructure-left-in-economic-chaos-was-it-worth-the-gamble\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/58d131891d0000f42c7cf8e5.jpeg\",\"datePublished\":\"2017-05-27T01:00:50+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2017-05-27T02:04:14+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/8c48bf89dc86da77b4d856c7b3b78d77\"},\"description\":\"The Rio Olympics may have been a bad bet for the South American city, which now has disastrous consequences from the games.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/rio-olympic-infrastructure-left-in-economic-chaos-was-it-worth-the-gamble\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/rio-olympic-infrastructure-left-in-economic-chaos-was-it-worth-the-gamble\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/rio-olympic-infrastructure-left-in-economic-chaos-was-it-worth-the-gamble\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/58d131891d0000f42c7cf8e5.jpeg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/58d131891d0000f42c7cf8e5.jpeg\",\"width\":600,\"height\":400,\"caption\":\"It was just nine months ago that Michael Phelps capped off his storied Olympics career inside this Rio de Janeiro aquatics center built for the 2016 Summer Games at a cost of $38 million. 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