Medals per capita
August 4th, 2012 at 4:19 pm by David FarrarThere is a website called Medals per capita. According to it NZ is:
- 1st for weighted medals per capita (gold=3, silver = 2, bronze = 1)
- 1st for gold medals per capita
- 2nd for all medals per capita
- 8th for medals by GDP
The site is maintained by NZer Craig Nevil-Manning.
Nice to see us doing pretty well.
August 4th, 2012 at 4:36 pm
And we were 10th on the overall medal table for a while last night (since dropped back to 12th).
It wouldn’t take much for us to lose a few more places (and to get passed by Austalia). We should enjoy 10thn on the table while we can.
But we still have some good medal prospects, including possible golds.
Vote:August 4th, 2012 at 4:37 pm
Talking of medals.
Did you know a gold medallist receives prize money of Stg 16,000, Silver Stg 10,000 or Bronze Stg 6,000.
In the US these prize winnings are taxable under their ‘worldwide’ tax model (source: BBC Online article “Why are US medal winnings taxed?)…..along with the medals themselves for Stg150, Stg 85 & Stg 1.20 respectively.
NZ has a ‘worldwide’ tax regime too. Will our successful athletes be liable to tax on their winnings??
Vote:Does anyone know? Would sure take the gloss off their efforts!
August 4th, 2012 at 4:43 pm
The Aussies have put a big investment in swimming where one can clock up a lot of medals. Because of the short distances and many athletes able to compete in multiple events. However they are not doing it this time. Ha ha ha ha.
Vote:August 4th, 2012 at 4:53 pm
medals per capita is meaningless. How about medals per dollars invested?
Vote:August 4th, 2012 at 4:58 pm
There seems to be ‘medals per x” sites appearing. Now:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/08/01/olympic-medals-map-gdp_n_1729090.html
Every country should be able to fond something to rate themselves with.
New Zealand is currently 1st equal on the “medals per winner” table.
Vote:August 4th, 2012 at 5:07 pm
And on http://www.london2012.com/medals/medal-count/ they have recently changed the ranking from golds/silvers/bronzes to total medals, so Aus is way above us now.
Vote:August 4th, 2012 at 6:12 pm
The Stats Department is contributing to the national feelgood factor as well and also keeping track of the medals per capita…
http://www.stats.govt.nz/browse_for_stats/population/estimates_and_projections/olympics.aspx
Unfortunately in true NZ public sector style, it appears not to be updating the site at weekends. No doubt for someone to do that would involve a day in lieu
Vote:August 4th, 2012 at 6:24 pm
Jocko…
The US medal bounty is taxed because they (athletes) are professional athletes.
But the US has a tax regime that a “John Banks bus” could drive thru. The result is very little tax.
Many years ago Rob Muldoon directed Inland Revenue Minister Hugh Templeton to introduce legislation that made “grants” to New Zealand elite athletes tax free. Grants became tax free.
Since then we have had two labour govts and now athletes are on state funded salaries.
Vote:August 4th, 2012 at 7:01 pm
Aren’t the Aussies lucky? After all, silver is the new gold. Hahaha!
Vote:August 4th, 2012 at 7:20 pm
I understand they will be changing their sporting colours from green and gold to green and silver.
Vote:August 4th, 2012 at 7:37 pm
The Gold Medals buy population says lots about our athletes.
The Medals by GDP says a lot about our economy:
Vote:August 4th, 2012 at 7:43 pm
.. um, that should be by population
I know it’s the IOC. A country can buy hosting, but not medals
Vote:August 4th, 2012 at 8:10 pm
I’m sure that, like me, you are very proud of our Olympic cycling bronze medal winners. Truly, they are sporting heroes who have done wonders for New Zealand sport.
I can’t wait for them to return home, when they will once again become wankers in Spandex who clog up the roads and get in the way of cars.
Vote:August 4th, 2012 at 8:59 pm
nasska,
Huck Haeata should be over there, like over there over there over there and never come back.
But she wants NZ to notice her – road lice becomes train lice.
Sad that she did not get off the Matangi and get on the Unit behind held up at the same platform, the offer was made.
But at the end of the day how did she get home? Police? TVNZ taxi? DP lift? Train? or did she ride her bike?
Shit, I hijacked that thread, sorry about that chief
Vote:August 4th, 2012 at 9:24 pm
tvb
Just in case anyone has any residual doubts …
Vote:August 4th, 2012 at 9:59 pm
I have always found the medals per capita a complete load of bollocks. It is so slanted to smaller populated countries to be completely and utterly meaningless i.e if New Zealand wins one gold medal, to be comparable UK would need to win approximately15 gold medals, USA approximately 60 gold medals and China what 300 gold medals plus.
Vote:August 4th, 2012 at 10:22 pm
Frederick – have you got any other way of working out medals per capita other than by employing basic arithmetic problems?
Vote:August 4th, 2012 at 10:53 pm
The country which most fascinates me is India.
India has a vast population yet perform so badly. While they do have many living in poverty, they do have over 50 million ‘middle class’ citizens.
Vote:August 5th, 2012 at 12:33 am
I had the same question looking at the medal table and considering India’s population.
After a bit of googling the answer seems to be, Indians don’t tend to play Olympic sports. Cricket is overwhelmingly the most popular sport in India, and it’s not an Olympic event. Compare with both North and South Korea, who get a decent handful of medals from the multiple martial arts competitions. The three factors which seem to decide medal tallys are (1) population, (2) GDP, and (3) popularity (or government promotion) of Olympic sports.
Vote:August 5th, 2012 at 8:18 am
I read somewhere that Michael Phelps now has more Olympic medals than India has won in its entire history! (men & women combined)
http://sports.yahoo.com/news/olympics–one-billion-vs–one–michael-phelps–one-man-medal-haul-could-match-all-of-india.html
Vote:August 5th, 2012 at 9:02 am
the 1,2,3 weighting is a little out, IMO. Perhaps
G=4
S=2
B=1
a doubling of value, for each medal, or maybe
G=5
Vote:S=3
B=2 ?
August 5th, 2012 at 9:16 am
There’s something so sad and desperate about all this “medals per capita” thing that always rears its ugly head.
We’re just a small-arse country with only a few awesome sports people, but you should respect us like the bigtime power player we LOVE to think we are!
Let’s get real… Olympic medals are won by individuals who excel (with a bit of government funding.) Not by the per-capita combined efforts of a whole bunch of slobs like me who sit on the couch watching the Olympics…
Vote:August 5th, 2012 at 10:36 am
Medals per capita will mean nothing until the day when each country can enter as many participants as they wish and when your average athletically gifted Bangladeshi can afford a $20,000 bike.
Vote:August 5th, 2012 at 11:41 am
Based on current Olympic performance Australia has been renamed Agstralia by the Queen.
Hat tip: Sickipedia.
Vote:August 5th, 2012 at 11:07 pm
@RRM – bullcrap – Australia budget around $60 million per gold medal that they want to win. If we had that sort of money we would win a lot more medals too.
Vote:August 6th, 2012 at 7:56 am
It’s amazing how many people get so hot under the collar over how many medals a country gets.
Vote:August 6th, 2012 at 4:59 pm
So, we’ve got three golds. China is roughly 300 times the population of NZ. So in order for China to be considered “as good as” NZ they should have 900 golds?
Per capita stats are pretty pointless :S
Vote: