The World Cup Is a Cash Grab. Fans Will Pay the Bill.: FIFA has built an $11 billion event that is too big to fail. But off the pitch, someone will win, and many others will lose. - "The organization’s relationship with the Trump administration has provided it with unfettered access to soccer’s largest untapped growth market and set it up to generate roughly $11 billion in total revenue for the upcoming tournament. It’s also put FIFA in a position of relative strength in negotiating with U.S. host cities. As part of its World Cup contract, the governing body maintains a full monopoly on not only broadcast and ticket rights but also concessions and sponsorships over the course of the tournament. The case FIFA made to host municipalities was, chiefly, that the residual economic benefits of accommodating the tournament—from tax revenue to increased business profits—would justify the costs attached to it. But this rationale was predicated on selling the World Cup to a full and open international marketplace—to say nothing of avoiding environmental pitfalls like economic slowdowns or widespread immigration enforcement–related fears. Now, with each of these one-time givens eroded, the arithmetic for host cities has been altered. Even more crucially, the math has been altered in ways that don’t apply to FIFA’s own accounting."
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