[Abram Jones]

Wealth and population are very large factors in international sports, they often negate attributes such as organization, cultural traits, and skill per capita/wealth. These documents include total medal tables for 2010, 2012, and 2014. 2016 will be added after the competition. Also included is the approximate "available" population of each country. This includes people living on at least the equivalent of 10 USD per day and in between the ages of 15 and 64. The data below is in millions.

average available population of countries with 20 or more medals
61.1
average available population of countries with 10 through 19 medals
13.4
average available population of countries with 1 through 9 medals
5.3

summer olympics: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1TLz_dlx-5f_P-HXfe4D4Xg320K6sN3uv_EMi_bK6pkw
winter olympics: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/13KCQTJ74sI-0YbbEua54pbBlgkoWu5PMOTgdD6FomRA
summer olympic commentary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C8-zCFEhhhI
winter olympic commentary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CtKNSyEobpw

[Decky]

Not to mention empires stealing athletes from their former colonies so the mother country gets the medal and not the place the athlete was actually born (Britain I'm looking at you).

[Drlee]

Oh good. We have another anti-US shit storm developing.

What is the point of this thread? To assert that the Jamaican bobsled team is an outlier? Or that really, Kenya is the Olympic powerhouse.

Sigh.

[mikema63]

Who cares? The Olympics is a world class waste of time and money for all involved.

[Abram Jones]

Oh good. We have another anti-US shit storm developing.

What is the point of this thread? To assert that the Jamaican bobsled team is an outlier? Or that really, Kenya is the Olympic powerhouse.

Sigh.

You don't need to go all emo on me, no one even mentioned the United States in this post until you... complex much? The point was pretty simple: Olympic Medal Counts Are Pointless Due To Wealth And Population Differences. Usually people use a country's medal counts as some sort of measurement of national athletic ability, when this is usually not the case.

Who cares? The Olympics is a world class waste of time and money for all involved.

It sure is a waste, I'll drink to that. But there are several reasons this information is important. Firstly, as evidence against simple, yet very common delusions. Secondly, it is a small part of a broader project that reaches deeper into socioeconomic principles.

[dgun]

I fear Russia's medal count will not be all that impressive this time around. Oh well, that's what happens when you're a big fat cheater.

[Abram Jones]

I fear Russia's medal count will not be all that impressive this time around. Oh well, that's what happens when you're a big fat cheater.

The very predictable thing is even if this ban holds up, larger richer countries will still dominate medal counts (: Olympic medal tables are meaningless except in rare cases when smaller poorer countries out perform larger richer ones.