For the past two weeks, Beijing has been the center of the world’s attention playing host to record breaking performances in world class athletics. As the Summer Olympics come to a close, the BOSTON GLOBE examines financial impact the Games have had on the host nation.

Victor Matheson, an associate economics professor at Holy Cross writing for THE GLOBE says, “Despite their success on the playing fields, the event has been an economic disaster for the Chinese.” Ouch. So I guess you’re saying that $40 billion price tag was a bit much.

Chicago, are you reading this?

Matheson adds, “The anticipated influx of tourists has not materialized, and despite ’selling every ticket’ many venues are half full. Indeed, Beijing’s tourism bureau predicts that the total number of visitors to the city this month will be virtually unchanged from the figures from the previous August.”

Along with the lack of tourists, there’s also that other thing that makes money in Beijing - industry. In order for the air in China to not look completely black, all of heavy industry in the city had to pretty much take these two weeks off.

But we’re just thinking short term disaster, give us the big picture disaster Mr. Economics professor:

Many hosts tout the Olympic Games as an opportunity to put their city on the map as a potential tourist destination. Both the Summer and Winter Games certainly lead to huge increases in name recognition for the host cities, but the fame is fleeting. Travel researchers have documented that Calgary’s image as the host of the 1988 Winter Games had begun to fade from memory as early as 1991.

Calgary hosted the Olympics? See I already forgot about that too.

And what about those 17,000 seat arenas that are hosting sports people only care about every four years?

The specialized sports infrastructure required to host an Olympic Games cannot easily be converted to other uses. The so-called Water Cube, the site of Michael Phelps’s golden achievements, is an architectural and technological wonder. But after the closing ceremony, Beijing will have little use for a state-of-the-art swimming facility that seats 17,000.

Beijing will join good company in wondering what to do with its beautiful but empty venues. Most of the 10 gleaming new stadiums built in South Korea for the 2002 World Cup sit unused today.

Chicago, are you reading this?

Matheson says it’s not all doom and gloom for China, though. The people are feeling good about their country, “An astounding 93 percent of Chinese surveyed by the Pew Research Center thought that the Games would improve the country’s image.”

The other seven percent could not be reached for comment, they have not been seen since the survey was conducted.