Do Fans Care About Compliance to Doping Regulations in Sports? The Impact of PED Suspension in Baseball

Jeffrey Cisyk and Pascal Courty

Journal of Sports Economics, 2017, vol. 18, issue 4, 323-350

Abstract: There is little evidence in support of the main economic rationale for regulating athletic doping that doping reduces fan interest. The introduction of random testing for performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs) by Major League Baseball (MLB) offers unique data to investigate the issue. The announcement of a PED violation (a) initially reduces home-game attendance by 8%, (b) has no impact on home-game attendance after 15 days, and (c) has a small negative impact on the game attendance for other MLB teams. This is the first systematic evidence that doping decreases consumer demand for sporting events.

Keywords: performance-enhancing drug; doping; baseball; major baseball league; attendance (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

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Working Paper: Do Fans Care about Compliance to Doping Regulations in Sports? The Impact of PED Suspension in Baseball (2015)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:jospec:v:18:y:2017:i:4:p:323-350

DOI: 10.1177/1527002515587441

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