Beijing 2008 and the one-ticket policy

China Photos/AFP/Getty Images

I can’t resist commenting about China’s one-ticket policy for the opening and closing ceremonies at the Beijing ’08 Olympics, which I mentioned in this morning’s brief. Obviously, China’s an enormous country with tens of millions of sports fans. So it’s difficult to accommodate everyone, as Wang Wei, a top official with the Beijing organizing committee, pointed out with unintended humor:

In an event telecast across the country on state-run CCTV, Wang acknowledged the one-ticket policy would made it difficult for families to attend the historic event.

“To make the most people happy, we adopted the (one-ticket) policy,” he said.

Though the policy only applies to the opening and closing ceremonies, tickets from other “high demand sessions” will be limited to two tickets per person.

But what’s the point of going to a huge event like the Olympic opening ceremonies if you can’t share it with anyone? True, families and friends can organize and try to arrange to buy individual tickets next to one another—but there doesn’t seem to be a way to guarantee that outcome. And it’s not as if ordinary Chinese will be able to shell out the $645 it costs to attend the opening ceremony. China’s adjusted GDP per capita is $7,600, and surely the median Chinese person earns less than that. So why not just hold an auction and sell the tickets to the highest bidder? There’s bound to be a black market anyway—making a mockery of efforts to make the Games accessible to average citizens—so why shouldn’t the government recoup some of its expenditures?