Greece spent lavishly on the 2004 Athens Games, with final budgets landing billions of dollars in the red.

According to a working paper by researchers at Oxford's Saïd Business School, the project went over budget by 60%. Greece also built too many hotel rooms and fell victim to hopes that the Olympics would lead to longer-term gains thanks to tourism.

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Many of the stadiums built for the Olympics, like the one shown here, now sit unused.

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