Stadium (Arena) Promises Never Pay

Rick Eckstein, professor of sociology, tackles on the sociological aspect of stadium lobbying.

Why, then, given the overwhelming academic research challenging stadium-centered economic development do political leaders (if not average citizens) still support such projects? In a just-released article in the Journal of Sport and Social Issues, my colleagues and I studied media coverage of 23 publicly financed stadium initiatives in 16 different cities, including Philadelphia. We found that the mainstream media in most of these cities is noticeably biased toward supporting publicly financed stadiums, which has a significant impact on the initiatives' success.

This bias usually takes the form of uncritically parroting stadium proponents' economic and social promises, quoting stadium supporters far more frequently than stadium opponents, overlooking the numerous objective academic studies on the topic, and failing to independently examine the multitude of failed stadium-centered promises throughout the country, especially those in oft-cited "success cities" such as Denver and Cleveland.

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He has a point.

*Credit - Sports Economist (link on the sidebar) for providing the story