奧運會是一大商機 誰是贏家輸家(5)

For advertisers, the Olympics should be a bonanza. Martin Sorrell, the boss of WPP, a British ad firm, often talks of the boost the global ad market receives when the Olympics, an American presidential election and the Euro football tournament more-or-less coincide every four years. Michael Nathanson of Nomura, an investment bank, predicts that the Olympics will pump up the American ad market by between $800m and $1 billion this year. The global bump in advertising will be $1.3 billion, reckons Jonathan Barnard of ZenithOptimedia, a consultancy.

對於廣告商來說，奧運會應當是一次發財的機遇。每隔四年，奧運會、美國總統選舉和歐洲盃或多或少都會存在時間上的重合。英國廣告公司 WPP 的老闆 Martin Sorrell 常常談及由此帶來的全球廣告市場熱潮。投資銀行野村證券（Nomura）的 Michael Nathanson 預測今年奧運會將提高美國廣告市場的收入，幅度約在8億至10億美元之間。諮詢公司 ZenithOptimedia 的 Jonathan Barnard 預計全球廣告收入增長將爲13億美元。

Others are more cautious. Non-sponsors assume that, if they advertise during the games, their message will get lost in the hubbub, says Ian Whittaker of Liberum Capital, a bank. He predicts that many will wait until September, and that the Olympic boost will be less than expected.

其他人則更爲謹慎。Liberum Capital 銀行的 Ian Whittaker 表示，非贊助商認爲如果在賽事持續期間做廣告，他們的商品信息將湮沒於一片喧囂嘈雜之中。他預測許多非贊助商將等到九月，而奧運廣告浪潮也將不如預期那麼火熱。

Governments of countries that host the Olympics usually boast that the games will generate vast economic returns for the nation. David Cameron, Britain's prime minister, promised to "turn these games into gold for Britain", to the tune of £13 billion over four years (see article). Several studies suggest that is unlikely. Victor Matheson of the College of the Holy Cross in Massachusetts finds that organisers of big sporting events tend to overestimate the benefits and underestimate the costs.

主辦奧運會的各國政府常常吹噓奧運賽事將爲國家帶來巨大的經濟回報。英國首相戴維·卡梅倫許諾"爲英國把賽事轉爲金幣"，稱四年的經濟回報總額將達130億英鎊（見另文）。幾項研究表明這種可能性不大。 馬薩諸塞州聖十字架大學（the College of the Holy Cross）的 Victor Matheson 認爲大型體育賽事組織者往往高估了利益而低估了成本。

They are particularly bad on opportunity costs, counting every penny that sports-mad tourists spend while forgetting that others will cancel trips to avoid the crush. South Korea attracted lots of football fans during the 2002 World Cup, but because so many non-fans stayed away total arrivals were the same as the previous year. Some of those who pitch up for a sporting event have merely rescheduled a trip planned for another date, and should not count as extra arrivals. Mr Matheson concludes that, though the gross economic impact of big sporting events is large, these losses mean the net effect is negligible.

這些組織者對於機會成本的預測極其不準。他們把體育狂熱遊客花費的每一分錢都計算在內，但完全忽略了其他取消出行以迴避高峯期的遊客。韓國在2002年世界盃期間吸引了許多足球球迷，但由於大批非球迷並未到來，總入境人數和上一年持平。其中有些搭起帳篷觀看體育賽事的遊客只是重新調整了本該去往別處的出行日程，不應該被計算在額外入境人數之內。Matheson 做出瞭如下結論：儘管大型體育賽事有顯著的總體經濟影響，但這種種損失意味着淨效應基本可以忽略不計。

It may even be negative. Host governments spend vast sums on building stadiums and sprucing up nearby railways and roads. The Olympic authorities could pick host cities that already have the necessary infrastructure in place, and in such places the games might turn a profit. But the IOC likes host cities to erect grand edifices with the Olympic name on them.

它甚至可能表現爲虧損。主辦國政府花費了大筆資金興建體育場館、整修附近公路鐵路。奧運當局原本可以從已經具備必要基礎設施的城市中選出主辦城市，在這樣的地方奧運賽事可能會帶來盈利。但那些建起帶有奧運名稱的高樓大廈的主辦城市才能得到國際奧委會的青睞。

The billions that Britain has spent on revamping bits of east London will generate benefits; but so would spending such sums on many other things. London's Olympic aquatic centre looks great, but it cost £269m—a great deal more than most public swimming pools. The roads built for the games may prove useful, but other projects might have done more good. They might have been cheaper, too; Olympic infrastructure tends to break budgets even more than infrastructure projects in general do. A recent working paper by Bent Flyvbjerg and Allison Stewart of the Saïd Business School at Oxford University found that every Olympiad since 1960 has gone over budget and that the average overrun, at 179%, was worse than for any other kind of mega-project.

英國修建翻新倫敦東部地區所花費的數十億英鎊或將產生利潤，但倘若把如此巨資投放在其它方面也會有所收益。倫敦的奧運水上中心令人歎爲觀止，但它耗費了2.69億英鎊——比大多數公共泳池都要昂貴許多。爲奧運會修建的道路或許有用處，但其它工程可能帶來更多裨益。而且，這些項目本可以耗費較少的資金；奧運會基礎設施往往比總基礎設施工程更吃預算。牛津大學 Saïd 商學院（the Saïd Business School at Oxford University）的 Bent Flyvbjerg 和 Allison Stewart 最近發表了一篇調查論文，他們發現自1960年起每個奧運週期的主辦開支都超過了預算，平均超支爲179%，高於各種其他大規模項目。

When the consumer sits down to watch the games, though, he is not interested in efficient infrastructure investment. He wants to see something that lifts his spirits. This cannot be guaranteed—but unlike other purported benefits, it is at least not ruled out by the data. A study by Stefan Szymanski of the University of Michigan and Georgios Kavetsos of the Cass Business School in London finds no statistically significant upswing in national happiness attributable to hosting the Olympics (in this it comes a poor second to the football World Cup). But it doesn't seem to do any harm. And maybe this one will be particularly uplifting. After all, what could be more fun than watching athletes sweat while eating fish and chips?

然而，當消費者坐下觀看比賽時，他可不會有興趣去了解在高效基礎設施方面投資了多少金錢。他只想去看一些振奮人心的東西。這一點無法得到保證——但和其它官方所標榜的利益不同，它至少不是通過數據來衡量的。密歇根大學（the University of Michigan）的 Stefan Szymanski 和倫敦卡斯商學院（the Cass Business School）的 Georgios Kavetsos 做了一項研究，發現沒有顯著數據表明主辦奧運會可以提升國民幸福感（在這方面奧運會甚至不如世界盃）。但主辦奧運似乎也不會帶來什麼損害。可能這一屆奧運會將特別令人振奮。畢竟，沒有什麼比邊吃炸魚薯條邊看運動員揮汗比賽更有趣了。