There are similar parallels with professional sport leagues in the US. Maybe the whole thing is a combination of government officials looking for prestige, and a couple of mediocre economists rattling off numbers to back it up?
Absolutely. There are plenty of elected officials who want the prestige bestowed by hosting a big international event (e.g. Formula 1, World Cup, the Olympics), and I think many of them believe the idea that the potential tourism revenue justifies the expense. Many citizens fully believe the same thing.
It's only recently that more people are realizing that the numbers don't usually add up. Even then, lots of people are so passionate about sports that they simply don't care about how much public money is poured into a black hole to host these events (or build stadiums). And that's not even getting into the corruption.
