Say No to Sports Subsidies

The National Football League on Tuesday announced that the St. Louis Rams would move to the Los Angeles suburb of Inglewood in a deal that called for no public funding toward the planned $1.9 billion stadium.

Similar attitudes have affected deals for numerous projects in the state. In Northern California, the Golden State Warriors are planning a $1 billion basketball arena without public funding, while the 49ers’ new stadium in Santa Clara had relatively little public aid.

And in Oakland, city officials on Wednesday reiterated that no public funding would be devoted to building a stadium to keep the Oakland Raiders from walking away.

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[A] wealth of academic studies [shows] that stadiums and arenas are poor investments when it comes to economic development. Without pro teams, would-be fans spend money on other local entertainment, economists have found, while sports facilities rarely spur real-estate development that wouldn’t have happened anyway.

Brown, Eliot and Carlton, Jim and Futterman, Matthew. "Cities Rethink Sports-Team Deals," The Wall Street Journal., Thursday, January 14, 2016, B1, Accessed on January 14, 2016, http://www.wsj.com/articles/cities-rethink-sports-stadium-deals-1452734069