Research finds employees watching 24 minutes of the Olympics each day in the office
August 8, 2016: Sporting Index, world’s largest sports spread betting business, has found that the cost to the British economy from workers watching the 31st Olympiad at work is a staggering £1.6 billion.
The leading spread betting firm commissioned pollsters Opinium to survey the British public ahead of the Games, and found that Olympic-watching Brits will spend 24 minutes on average tuning into the sporting action from Brazil while at work.
Over the 15 working days of the Games, each employee will use up to six workday hours watching Team GB online – costing the British economy 126 million lost working hours.
Taking the UK average wage of £12.75 per hour, up to £1.6bn will be paid to UK workers for cheering on British athletes.
The research revealed a slight disparity in the viewing preferences between the sexes, with women devoting 22 minutes of their working day to the Olympics, compared to 27 minutes for men.
The survey also found that the British public will lose 302 million hours of sleep due to staying up to catch the late night drama from Rio3.
Ed Fulton, trading spokesman for Sporting Index, said: “With the action from Rio starting early afternoon most days and available online in just a few clicks, even the most diligent employees may come down with a case of Olympics fever and be tempted to secretly tune in”.