Will the 2016 Rio Olympic Games be remembered as a success or a failure? It’s hard to know the answer yet.
What we do know, however, is that in the bizarro world of hosting Olympic Games, the cost overruns for Rio are actually quite favorable compared to numbers from past events.
Always Overbudget
The study found the average cost overruns for Olympic Games to be a whopping 156% from 1968 to 2016. This means that the Rio Games were a budgeting success, at least in relative terms, by ‘only’ running 51% overbudget.
It should be noted that the study accounts only for sports-related costs, such as those relating to operations or building venues. The study excludes indirect capital costs such as upgrading transport or hotel infrastructure, since data on these costs is harder to come by, and is often unreliable. Also, some Olympic Games were omitted from the study, as they did not have available public data on the costs involved.
Source: http://www.visualcapitalist.com/rio-games-success-51-percent-overbudget/
