by Felix Richter, Statista.com
— this post authored by Martin Armstrong
The honour of hosting the most illustrious of sporting events in your country not only requires an incredible amount of time and effort during the application process but also a huge sum of money once you’ve been given the go-ahead by the IOC.
This infographic shows not only how expensive the games can be but also how uncontrollable these costs so often turn out to be. The most recent games in Rio cost (as of January 2016) 4.56 billion U.S. dollars – 51 percent over budget.
The largest overspend in recent history was in Spain for Barcelona 1992. After an initial estimate of 2.6 billion dollars, the final bill came to 9.69 billion – 266 percent over budget. Tokyo is currently forecast to run over on a major way. With initial estimates of 2.5 billion dollars, The Japanese organisers are apparently staring down the barrel of a 500 percent overspend.
This chart shows the initial cost estimates and eventual overspends of the past 7 Olympic summer games and an estimate for Tokyo 2020.
You will find more statistics at Statista.
