The successful production of major league sports has become increasingly dependent on stadiums. Although stadiums do not exhibit the properties of public goods, they have increasingly become governmentally funded projects. Lost in the political debate over stadium funding is the usefulness of the residual claimancy argument to the success of a team. If this argument holds, receiving a publicly financed stadium mitigates the incentive for an owner to place a competitive product on the field. The evidence in this article demonstrates that public ownership of a stadium negatively affects the winning percentage of the team that plays in it.
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