GB got a lot of Olympic medals.Relative to GDP and pop only Oz do better. Why does the rich US fail this test?

Question

From a purely economic point of view...in terms of wealth per person etc the USA seem to under achieve so badly in all sports in relative terms. They have climates to accommodate all sports from swimming to skiing and (No I am NOT as racist) a gene pool which covers all the sporting skills.

Yet GB with 1/3 the population and 2/3rd's the wealth per person seem to be able to put up, in relative terms, a 'better' showing?

Answer 1

People are so obsessed with the U.S.

do you really believe we failed

yes, second in gold medals

but is that really a failure

there is only so many events and sports that are of importance here, and a finite amount of gold medals.....

I don't see this Olympics as a failure at all

Answer 2

the us government does not spend tax dollars on the olympics

http://www.america.gov/st/washfile-engli...

we also help train foreign athletes

http://www.forbes.com/business/2008/08/2...

Answer 3

Australia funds their Athletes to the sum of 14 Million Dollars Australian per Gold Medal, approximately.

Not many country's are this obsessed with sports.

Answer 4

I imagine GB has put in a lot more money into training in the past few years so that they can put on a good showing at the 2012 games in London. If you go back to say the '96 Atlanta games though, they only got 1 gold medal and 15 medals total.  

Answer 5

I congradulate the British for their achievements, it is good to see they get the preparation on it's way already now so they will even do better in 2012.

I don't think we can use 'failure' to describe the US team... as they are still the strongest and the best national team ever. Perhaps they failed on some individual events in this olympics but their team sports overall is still the strongest...

Even in this Olympic Games, they still equals the gold medals they got with Athens Olympics..

It is more likely the improvment on performence for some countries like Britain, China and Jamaica that make this Games different than previous ones when we saw US teams pulling way ahead of others.

I understand what you meant, but I don't think the population nor the wealth per person has anything to do with the results.  India has a huge population and only (or I should say finally) got their first medal. and as for Kenya, their wealth is perhaps 1/100 of that of American.

It's more likely related to better talents, funding, coaching, and overall, a promotion of better sports culture. And with all these, American is still the strongest of all.

Answer 6

You're right. We suck. Too bad you don't suck like we do. I'm so humiliated that I am an American. How did your ladies rowing 8s do?

Answer 7

I always love these types of comparisons, they betray a level of inherent stupidity on the part of the person asking them that always gives me a good chuckle.  

As if there is some form of global market for olympic medals where they can be purchased by governments on the basis of a per-GDP ratio.  Never mind that some countries have centralised, government funded olympic programmes (China, UK, Aust) whereas the US does not.  Or that some countries focus most of their sporting attention on sports returning few or no olympic medals, whereas others are obsessed with 'proving' themselves to the world by appearing at the top of the medal tally.

Answer 8

Who knows, but one reason may be that the two most popular sports in the US are American football and basketball, and basketball only yields two medals.  If you participate in either of those sports (one in the fall semester, one in the spring semester), you're not going to be able to participate in track, swimming, soccer or many other sports.  Gymnastics, tennis, golf, and those types of sports are too expensive for most people and it's not something you can just go out and learn on your own.  The US government doesn't give people money to pay for sports.  Tiger Woods and the Williams sisters were coached by their dads.  Who knows where they'd be otherwise.   Most kids teams are supported by their local pizza joints or dry cleaners or whatever.  Nobody is going to give a parent money so their kid can participate in gymnastics.  Nastia Liukin was also coached by her dad.  Still, I think the US did well and I'm proud that Michael Phelps and Bryan Clay (decathlon gold) are American.  I'm surprised that so many of you think that 36 golds is failure when it's about as many as the US team has ever brought home.

On the other hand, the US is dominant in many other areas. Everyone hates America and ridicules American culture, and yet they stand in line for hours to get an iPhone and then go home and download rock music and American movies onto them.  If I hated the people of a country as much as many of you hate Americans, I don't think I would sit back and watch them on television and the movies.