According to the first plan, the sum of €6 billion is three times higher than the original budget.
Hosting the Summer Olympics doesn’t come cheap. France’s highest auditing authority has said in a report just published that French taxpayers footed a nearly €6 billion bill for Paris 2024. This was told by Politico. The first plan had a budget three times lower.
France’s Court of Auditors found that state and local authorities spent €2.77 billion to help organize the Games and an additional €3.19 billion on infrastructure. Initially, the French government promised that public funding for the Games would total around €1 billion.
In a response included in the report, Tony Estanguet, President of the 2024 Paris Organizing Committee, disputed the auditors’ figures and said the true public cost attributable to the event “does not exceed €2 billion.” Estanguet also noted that the projected economic benefits linked to the Olympics are “three to five times that amount.”
