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Professional Sports Subsidies and Urban Congestion Externalities: Assessing 50 Years of Failed Urban Economic Development Policies

Professional Sports Subsidies and Urban Congestion Externalities: Assessing 50 Years of Failed... For the past 50 years, state and local governments in North America heavily subsidized the construction of professional sports facilities despite the fact that only private activity takes place in these facilities. Proponents of these subsidies frequently claim that they are justified because they represent viable local economic development projects. A proponents claim a new facility will “pay for itself” by generating large tangible economic benefits, including increases in tax revenues. This paper summarizes the existing literature that contains no evidence supporting these claims, along with a new literature containing evidence that professional sports events cause a number of negative urban congestion externalities like increased crime and traffic. The paper also documents trends in subsidization over the past 50 years and discusses reasons why these subsidies persist. The paper emphasizes the role played by my research in this area. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Eastern Economic Journal Springer Journals

Professional Sports Subsidies and Urban Congestion Externalities: Assessing 50 Years of Failed Urban Economic Development Policies

Humphreys, Brad R.
Eastern Economic Journal , Volume 49 (4) – Oct 1, 2023
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References (44)

Publisher
Springer Journals
Copyright
Copyright © EEA 2023. Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.
ISSN
0094-5056
eISSN
1939-4632
DOI
10.1057/s41302-023-00245-2
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

For the past 50 years, state and local governments in North America heavily subsidized the construction of professional sports facilities despite the fact that only private activity takes place in these facilities. Proponents of these subsidies frequently claim that they are justified because they represent viable local economic development projects. A proponents claim a new facility will “pay for itself” by generating large tangible economic benefits, including increases in tax revenues. This paper summarizes the existing literature that contains no evidence supporting these claims, along with a new literature containing evidence that professional sports events cause a number of negative urban congestion externalities like increased crime and traffic. The paper also documents trends in subsidization over the past 50 years and discusses reasons why these subsidies persist. The paper emphasizes the role played by my research in this area.

Journal

Eastern Economic Journal – Springer Journals

Published: Oct 1, 2023

Keywords: Subsidies; Professional sports; Urban development policy; D04 (Microeconomic Policy: Formulation, Implementation, and Evaluation); D42 (Monopoly); H25 (Business Taxes and Subsidies); Z23 (Sports Economics - Finance)

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