arcoarkona

you can see here plenty of articles citing profits for ~50% of olympics: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_the_Olympic_Games (estimates obviously don't include a bunch of intangible costs/profits).

I'm sure you could construct a list that shows no profits ever, and a list that shows massive profits every time (using the same level of evidence for both sides).

the primary issue is that it's extremely difficult to measure costs/profits for something as massive as an olympics. the secondary issue is that people tend to support their 'sides' narrative (keynesian or otherwise).

having the olympics costs a country X amount, and earns a country Y amount.

for some reason I think most people put Y at 0, and say that the country has wasted X (talking only about the 'price tag' of hosting). I can't tell whether people doing that are being dishonest to support a narrative, or whether they actually think that hosting an olympics earns a country nothing.

you can argue that Y is often or always less than X, but I rarely see Y even acknowledged.