Joe, there was a wheat dole in Rome where citizens could obtain it for free (paid for by taxes, of course). Sometimes a wealthy person would put on games and charge no admission, but you WERE expected to clap and cheer that person; emperors seem to have been especially prone to this. Oft times food was also provided, paid for by the sponsor.

But as Juvenal said in his "Satire 10":

...iam pridem, ex quo suffragia nulli
uendimus, effudit curas; nam qui dabat olim
imperium, fasces, legiones, omnia, nunc se
continet atque duas tantum res anxius optat,
panem et circenses.