Mega-Events and Sectoral Employment: The Case of the 1996 Olympic Games

Arne Feddersen and Wolfgang Maennig

No 35, Working Papers from Chair for Economic Policy, University of Hamburg

Abstract: This paper contributes to the analysis of large sporting events using highly disaggregated data. We use the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta, which are also outstanding as one of the very few large sporting events where ex post academic analysis found significant positive effects. This paper extends earlier studies in several ways. First, monthly rather than quarterly data will be employed. Second, the impact of the 1996 Olympics will be analyzed for 16 different sectors or subsectors. Third, in addition to standard DD models, we use a non-parametric approach to flexibly isolate employment effects. Regarding the Olympic effect, hardly any evidence for a persistent shift in the aftermath of or the preparation for the Olympic Games is supported. We find a significant positive employment effect in the monthly employment statistics exclusively during the staging of the Olympic Games (July 1996). These short-term effects are concentrated in the sectors of “retail trade”, “accommodation and food services”, and “arts, entertainment, and recreation”, while other sectors showed no such effects.

Keywords: Olympic Games; Economic Impact; Ex-post Analysis; Employment; Sectoral Data (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: H54 L83 R12 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 40 pages
Date: 2010-03-15
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-lab, nep-spo and nep-tur
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (21)

Published in Hamburg Contemporary Economic Discussions, Issue 35, 2010

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.hced.uni-hamburg.de/WorkingPapers/HCED-035.pdf First version, 2010 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: MEGA-EVENTS AND SECTORAL EMPLOYMENT: THE CASE OF THE 1996 OLYMPIC GAMES (2013)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hce:wpaper:035

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Working Papers from Chair for Economic Policy, University of Hamburg Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wolfgang Maennig ().