Portugal, organizing the Mundial is an unprofitable business

History shows that organizing such a tournament usually turns out to be a failure for the host country. Have we learned from the example of Euro 2004?

The Economist asked the following question last November: "Is the World Cup a big waste of money?". For Portugal, which will co-host the Mundial in 2030 along with Spain and Morocco, this question from the British magazine should provoke collective reflection.

The cost of building some stadiums at Euro 2004 exceeded projected costs by 200%, and some are now referred to as 'white elephants'.

Organizing the World Cup is far from a profitable business. This is shown in the study "The Structural Deficit of the Olympic Games and World Championships" by Martin Muller, David Gogishvili and Sven Daniel Wolf of the Department of Geography and Sustainable Development at the University of Lausanne in Switzerland, cited by the British publication.

Since 1966, only one edition of this tournament has generated more revenue than expenses: the 2018 World Cup in Russia boasts a positive ending balance of about 240 million dollars. On the other hand, with the exception of the megalomaniacal Qatar World Cup, which after a major investment''authorities would be considered the most expensive tournament in history, the 2002 World Cup in Japan/Korea caused the largest loss: -$4.8 billion.

In these calculations, the authors took into account the costs and revenues directly related to the organization of the competition and did not take into account other aspects that are usually also associated with mega-events, such as the impact on tourism and international reputation, the environmental footprint and investments in public infrastructures such as subways or cities, for example - aspects that will be addressed in a new project that this research team will be working on since February on the economic, social and environmental sustainability of more than 20 major