Cricket Vs Baseball

Howard J Wall of the Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis, has compared the role of cricket and baseball in the economic growth of the countries where it is played, in Cricket versus Baseball as an Engine of Growth

From a study of the real per capita growth rates of 95 non-OPEC and non-comminist countries during 1960-90, Wall found the following
"Countries that played neither cricket nor baseball tended to grow 104% in real terms over the period. Cricket-playing caused the rate of growth of cricket-playing countries to be pushed to 43% lower than this. However, this effect of cricket on growth was not statistically significant. Most strikingly, baseball-playing caused countries to have growth rates that were 80% above what they would have been if the countries did not play baseball, and 123% above what they would have been if they instead played cricket! This large estimated positive effect of baseball on growth is statistically significant at the 5% level."

For Wall, the arguement between cricket and baseball was a no contest, "For emerging countries without a history of cricket or baseball, baseball instruction and subsidies should be an immediate priority. With the help of international institutions like the World Bank and the IMF, baseball aid should flow from the baseball powers, the US and Japan. The difficult problem is in devising a plan to eradicate the cricket-induced malaise of the cricket-playing countries. Clearly this is a task of Herculean proportions, rivalled only by the economic reform of formerly-communist countries. Like communism, years of cricket have polluted the very souls of these countries, and we need to measure the pace of reform in decades, not merely in years."

Tim Harford, argues that since Wall published his paper, "India has enjoyed a sharp increase in its growth rate while one of the world’s leading baseball powers, Japan, has entered a long slump." It follows that the difference would have narrowed down considerably since. At this rate cricket could end up winning the battle. But China could hold the balance of power in the ongoing battle!

Now the Wall study is a simple statistical compilation and does not provide for more controlled analysis of the issue. I can suggest a few controlled experiments, which will help capture more specific instances of the influence of cricket and baseball on national economic performances and also compare the two games.

1. The performance of the stockmarkets when a major baseball or cricketing event has taken place. eg the performance of the markets in the days preceding and succeeding the World Series finals and World Cup finals.
2. A more localized economic growth performance, within baseball and cricket playing countries, of regions/states with strong and weak teams.
3. Performance of countries and states/regions, before and after baseball or cricket became popular.
4. Performances of companies with and without strong baseball and cricket teams. This can be further controlled by comparing the performances of the same companies' branches, which have strong/weak/no cricket and/or baseball teams.