Who are the champions? Inequality, economic freedom and the olympics

Kufenko, Vadim; Geloso, Vincent

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Kufenko, Vadim ; Geloso, Vincent

Who are the champions? Inequality, economic freedom and the olympics

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URN: urn:nbn:de:bsz:100-opus-16961
URL: http://opus.uni-hohenheim.de/volltexte/2020/1696/

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SWD-Schlagwörter:

Olympische Spiele , Ungleichheit

Freie Schlagwörter (Englisch):

Olympics , Inequality , Economic Freedom , Institutions

Institut:

Institut für Volkswirtschaftslehre

DDC-Sachgruppe:

Wirtschaft

Dokumentart:

ResearchPaper

Schriftenreihe:

Hohenheim discussion papers in business, economics and social sciences

Bandnummer:

2019,13

Sprache:

Englisch

Erstellungsjahr:

2019

Publikationsdatum:

14.01.2020

Lizenz:

Veröffentlichungsvertrag mit der Universitätsbibliothek Hohenheim

Kurzfassung auf Englisch:

Does a countrys level of inequality affect its ability to win Olympic medals? If it does, is it conditional on institutional factors? We argue that the ability of economically free societies to win medals will not be affected by inequality. In these societies, institutions generate incentives to invest in the talent pool of individuals at the bottom of the income distribution (people who are otherwise constrained in the ability to expend resources on athletic training). These effects cancel out those of inequality. In unfree societies, the incentives that promote investments in skills across the income distribution are weaker. Consequently, the effects of inequality on the ability to win are stronger. Using the Olympics of 2012 and 2016 in combination with the Economic Freedom of the World Index, we find that inequality only matters in determining medal numbers for unfree countries. We link these results to the debates on inequality.