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LONDON. — The Olympics medals table was again dominated by the biggest countries like the US, which finished top. But how would the table look if population and wealth were taken into account?
When it comes to counting the medal spoils, there is a strong sense of deja vu.
Every four years, the same few countries rack up medal after medal — the US, China, Russia — and Tokyo 2020 was no different.
The US won 113 medals total, including 39 golds, the most of any country.
So, what makes countries like the US dominate, while others lag behind?
Economists and data nerds have a few theories.
“It’s still loud and clear from the patterns that what matters is population, level of income, and political system,” says David Forrest, an economist at the University of Liverpool who researches Olympic predictions.
Population matters, Forrest says, because the bigger the pool of athletes, the more likely it is for a country to produce true competitors.
“It’s clear that very few people who are born have got the potential to be a world-class athlete,” he says. Take a country like Luxembourg, which has a population of 633,622.
They sent 12 athletes to compete in seven sports, and won no medals.
The US, which has the third-largest population in the world, sent 613 athletes to compete in 35 sports and took home more medals than any other country.
Some countries over-perform, given their population size. —BBC Sport.
Online Reporter