ABSTRACT

The past 20 years have witnessed a massive transformation of professional sports infrastructure in North America and the rest of the world. In the United States and Canada alone, by 2012, 125 of the 140 teams in the five largest professional sports leagues, the National Football League (NFL), Major League Baseball (MLB), National Basketball Association (NBA), Major League Soccer (MLS), and National Hockey League (NHL), will play in stadia constructed or significantly refurbished since 1990. This new construction has come at a significant cost, the majority of which has been borne by taxpayers. Construction costs alone for major league professional sports facilities have totaled in excess of $30 billion in nominal terms over the past two decades, with over half of the cost being paid by the public. See Tables 14.1-14.5 for lists of newly constructed or refurbished stadia in various American sports leagues. It should be noted that these figures understate the total level of public subsidies directed toward spectator sports, as they exclude subsidies not directly related to infrastructure and also ignore minor league and collegiate sports as well as other popular professional sports such as golf, tennis, and auto racing.