Thinking Right and Wrong, Not Left and Right About the Olympics

In a free society, citizens would not be forced to foot the bills for Olympic deficits nor face eminent domain abuse.

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We’re two weeks past the closing ceremony of the Paris Olympics. In hindsight, the games were a welcome reprieve from the strife that seems to be tearing Western societies apart—wokeness, gender fluidity, DEI, ESG, and racism fueled by CRT, antisemitism and good old-fashioned homophobia; nationalism, progressivism, populism, authoritarianism, cynicism—the list goes on and on. Yes, much of the opening ceremony was, uh, “French.” But the finale with the lighting of the Olympic flame and Celine Dion singing Edith Piaf’s “Hymne A L’Amour” from the Eiffel Tower was magnificent. And “Frenchness” resurfaced at the closing, only to be saved by Tom Cruise rappelling into Stade de France Mission Impossible style, taking off with the Olympic flag for Los Angeles on his motorcycle.

But the games were thankfully spared demonstrations and terrorist incidents, and almost without exception the dedication, competitiveness, and stunning performances by the thousands of athletes took center stage. This was human achievement in sports at its best. If you tuned out completely because of being put-off by the opening ceremony or because of two XY boxers competing as women, well, the loss was yours. 

Athletic positives aside, what do we make of the Olympics from a Think Right or Wrong, Not Left or Right point of view? More specifically, how does bidding for and hosting the games square with respecting and protecting individual rights, including property rights, the central tenet of Capitalism as the only moral social system? The short answer is that, in its current form, it doesn’t. But why? Here are a few reasons: 

1. In the past 20-30 years, bidding for the games has cost $50-150 million per candidate city/region. Host candidates must submit elaborate business plans, and wine, dine and, rumor has it, bribe Olympic officials. Local Olympic committees may raise private funds, but more often than not, government force has been applied in the form of putting taxpayers on the hook for financing the bid. 

2. As expensive as bidding has become, it pales in comparison with hosting the games which costs billions of dollars, including paying for the construction of new athletic venues and infrastructure improvements (hotels, airports, ground transportation, roads, etc.). The record so far is held by the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia, which is reputed to have cost $50 billion. The tab for the Paris games that just concluded was about $9 billion. Except for Los Angeles 1984, hosting has always been a financially losing proposition, with losses often in the billions as well. As a result, taxpayers have been forced to foot the bill for everything from upfront costs to bond issues with long maturities. For example, Montreal didn’t finish paying off its debt for the 1976 summer games until 2006, more than a generation later. And the financial strain from the Athens 2004 Olympics supposedly contributed to Greece’s debt crisis, adding insult to injury for a population already subject to massive individual rights violations. 

3. Making room for athletic venues, and improving infrastructure often requires using eminent domain, forcibly seizing property from individuals and businesses, or evicting people against their will. Whether just compensation was provided is beside the point, unless the individual or business agreed to the transaction. From a capitalist perspective, seizing property against the will of the owner, or breaching a contract against the will of the lessee, is an individual rights violation and therefore immoral.  

What about all the supposed positives that come with hosting? New jobs created before, during and after the Olympics, spending by athletes and visitors/spectators during the games, PR for the host city, and so on? The research is quite definitive that all the positives touted by the organizers and promoters of hosting the games are rarely if ever realized. Case in point, Salt Lake City estimated that 70,000 jobs would be created as a result of hosting the 2002 winter games, but reality showed only a 10^th of that, or around 7,000, were in fact created. And venues constructed for the games often deteriorate or are underused afterwards, as many of them weren’t constructed based on an organic demand but as one-time showpieces. But even if the benefits were realized, this is not a valid reason for violating the rights of individuals as outlined above.

The Olympic Games will hopefully continue to be staged long past Capitalism having become the dominant social system around the world. But they will be organized and financed in a fashion that doesn’t violate individual rights, and that doesn’t involve government (unless rights are indeed violated, in which case metering out justice and punishing the offenders via the court system is a valid function of government). Under Capitalism, the games will most likely be profitable, but if not, paid for with voluntary means, not with individual rights violating taxes forcibly extracted from the citizenry.

Perhaps it’s time to resurrect the idea of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) permanently staging the summer games in Athens, Greece, the home country of the Olympic Games. And while it’s at it, the winter games in the region of its “hometown” Lausanne, Switzerland. Set a good capitalist example by acquiring land for, building, owning and managing the athletic venues, and paying for infrastructure improvements, without government funding and without violating property rights. No, I’m under no illusions that the IOC will seize the opportunity, but others have had similar ideas, so it may gain traction one of these days. Until then, my advice is to vote “no,” if an Olympic bid is contemplated by city near you.