“You are forgetting the boost to the local economy...”
A music show does not produce wealth, which is the only true boost to an economy, it just moves money from one pants pocket to another.
I respectfully disagree.
A music show is a huge production involving hundreds if not thousands of employees. I worked at the Carrier Dome in Syracuse doing Events Production for two years. I set up for concerts, sporting events and any other event that rented a 50K seat arena.
Saying it just moves money from one pocket to another is the same as saying the entire Service Based Economy of the USA does not contribute to GDP. Which is BS.
Putting on a concert at a 60M+ seat stadium is a massive endeavor. Typically involving hundreds of people setting up staging, seats, concessions, sound equipment, security, merchandise vendors, food and beverage vendors, parking attendants, police, ambulance EMTs, etc. Each one of these people preforming these jobs actually gets paid pretty well.
These are just the people who directly get paid by the actual stadium facility.
In addition a major concert tour has at least two staging crews setting up at one stadium while another exact same crew is taking down equipment from the previous show at another location. Then they leap frog, so to speak, to the next show. That way the actual entertainment crew goes from one show to the next and everything is ready to go when they arrive. When I was involved in this back in 1985 those guys were all Teamsters.
In the metro areas where these major concerts happen there is an increase in hotel occupancy. Many hotels sell out. The restaurants and bars are all packed prior and after the show. All of these hotel employees, restaurant employees, Uber drivers, Taxi Drivers, Limo Drivers all earn money what contributes to the economic prosperity to that local area.
What do those employees do with their income?
Even the lowest paid illegal immigrant maid cleaning a hotel room most likely uses that income to pay rent, buy groceries, pay utilities, and maybe have a little left over to spend on herself OR send home to Momma in El Salvador.
I was well paid(for a student) working at the Carrier Dome back in 1985. I used that money to pay rent, buy books, put fuel in my pickup and maybe have enough left over to buy some Old Milwaukee beers or some other cheap swill and a couple of slices of pizza.