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Study: Largest, wealthiest nations are biggest Olympics winners
The countries that will win the most medals at the Olympic Games in Sydney, Australia, this month are those with a high gross domestic product (GDP), according to research by Yale and Dartmouth experts.
In fact, the only "real uncertainty" about the Olympics' outcome "is which countries will feel the sharpest disappointment over their poor performances," say the authors of a new study from the Amos Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth and the Yale School of Management (SOM).
The scholars also predict a second straight decline in total medals for the United States this year.
Meghan R. Busse, assistant professor of economics at Yale SOM, and Andrew B. Bernard, associate professor at Dartmouth's Amos Tuck School, are co-authors of the new research study, titled "Who Wins the Olympic Games." Busse, who teaches microeconomics and
After tracking socio-economic data and Olympic medal totals since 1960, Busse and Bernard assert that a country with a small population but high per capita income will win about the same number of Olympic medals as one with a large population but low per capita income. "Olympic medal totals are highly correlated with total gross domestic product; population size and per capita income contribute equally," they say.
According to these researchers, "Countries such as the United States or Germany win large numbers of medals since they have both large populations and high per capita GDP." China wins more medals than France, they suggest, because its huge population more than compensates for its low per capita income. Brazil and Spain win almost the same number of medals due to the large population of Brazil (four times greater) and the higher per capita income of Spain (more than three times greater), they explain.
The dominance of the largest and wealthiest countries has eroded over time, say the experts. This trend has led to a greater number of countries winning medals and lower medal shares for countries such as the United States and Russia.
They also identify countries that underperform and overachieve given their populations and incomes. Japan's Olympic medal performance, for instance, has lagged far behind what would be expected given its resources, they say. In order not to underperform in Sydney this month, Japan will have to increase its medal total from 1996 by more than one-third, according to the Yale and Dartmouth researchers.
Bernard and Busse predict that this year's Australian hosts should do very well. The study finds evidence that hosting the Olympics boosts the medal total for the host country by an additional 1.5% of the medals beyond what their GDP predicts. The authors forecast that the Olympic home turf advantage might yield as many as
A copy of the study "Who Wins the Olympic Games" is available online at www.mba.yale.edu.
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