If you’ve been watching the Olympics, you have likely seen a commercial where a young girl watches Olympian Elana Meyers Taylor on TV with a glimmer in her eye that she, too, could be a gold medalist one day. The Olympics make us think that anyone can represent their country and go for the gold, with just a little bit of talent and luck. But in all reality, the cost of raising an Olympian is a luxury for the rich, or those willing to sacrifice everything for their child to make it.
In an article from 2010, Forbes examined the cost of raising an Olympian, which at that time, ranged from $6,000-$30,000 annually. Parents of hopeful figure skaters reported spending hundreds of thousands of dollars over their child’s life preparing them for the Olympics. While most extracurricular activities will cost a family something, these costs are well above what someone would pay for after school sports programs, making this level of training unattainable for the average family’s budget.
This year, Olympic athletes come from all over the United States. Utah boasts the most Olympic athletes, with 9 hailing from Park City and 6 from Salt Lake City. When we dig into the demographics of these areas, we see that the median household income in Park City is nearly double the national median at roughly $120,000. Salt Lake City has a more modest median household income of about $67,000, just over the national median.
The other cities that have the most Team USA athletes at the 2022 Winter Olympics are Steamboat Springs, CO with 5 athletes, Anchorage, AK matching them with 5, and 3 athletes qualifying from each of these cities: Tahoe City, CA, Ocala, FL, McFarland, CA, Carlsbad, CA and Duluth, MN. All of these cities, except for Ocala and Duluth, have median household incomes well above the national median.
Overall, the areas of the country that are home to ski resorts have significantly higher home prices compared to the rest of the country. Looking at a 5-mile radius around each ski area in the country, we see that the average income in ski areas is about $105,000, while the national average is $94,500, meaning that these areas have an average income 11% higher than the national average. Average rent is slightly lower ($914 versus $940), but average housing prices are $330,000, 37% above the national average of $240,500. In California, average home value is $614,000 in ski areas, $547,000 in Colorado and $577,000 in Utah.
So, what is the real price of gold, especially for the families? The Olympics remains a competition for mostly wealthy children, raised in expensive areas of the country.
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