Jimithyashford t1_j6uyoq2 wrote on February 2, 2023 at 1:45 AM

Professional team sports stadiums one of the few ways to spend tax money that is:

1- objectively useless

2- brings absolutely nothing to a city

3- does not create jobs or drive business

4- is a blatant hand out to the already wealthy

And yet somehow

5- you absolutely must do or your citizens will loathe you and vote you out of office

jonjonjay t1_j6y09zn wrote on February 2, 2023 at 6:14 PM

1- Brings Entertainment 2- Brings something you would t otherwise have 3- Jobs are here that weren't 20 years ago and the restaurants and businesses around it would disagree 4- I'll agree with this one 5- Usually how it works

Jimithyashford t1_j6y4et3 wrote on February 2, 2023 at 6:40 PM

I think I need to clarify. I was not saying these things ABOUT PROFESSIONAL SPORTS, I was saying them about spending taxpayer money on stadiums is these things. I will elaborate:

1- It's useless in the sense that these teams are profitable enough to upgrade and improve or even build their own stadiums. The only reason taxpayers feel compelled to pay for these things is that teams threaten to leave and go to a town that will, if all towns just said "no, we wont" then the industry would pay for it themselves, or just play in less grandiose stadiums, which is a perfectly viable option.

2- Again, establishing a sports teams, fine, it's good for a town to have a home team, sure, but spending big tax bucks to convince them not to leave? Especially when they COULD afford to do these things themselves? Crap. It literally brings in nothing, just spends a big ole fat wad of cash to convince them not to go.

3- I submit to you that no business in the vicinity of the stadium will see any meaningful change to their business once this money is spent and the remodels are done. I submit it is very unlikely this spending will cause any new nearby business to open that otherwise would not have. I also submit that none of the businesses in the, say, mile radius of the Stadium, that currently exist and are successful, would not exist or would not have been successful if that stadium had stayed a fairly modest municipal stadium in perpetuity. Now of course I can't "prove" that, but I can point to the existence of several studies showing that after large multi-million dollar tax payer funded renovations of stadiums, local businesses see negligible to non-existent change to their business.

So again, just to be clear, I am not poo-pooing the idea of having a home town sports team. What I am suggesting is that the taxpayers being held sort of pseudo hostage by these teams for large expensive remodels which they can afford but obviously would rather us pay for, is crappy, and that spending has utterly no benefit to any of us, other than placating the blackmailer for the privilege of their continued company.