Why Do Professionals Get Paid So Much? November 24, 2007
Posted by umenyiora in Sports.Tags: money, pay, pro sports salaries, Sports
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People spend hours every day, working their asses off, getting a horrible salary. They work all day, and then they come home, and work all night, preparing for the next day. This is what a real job is, one that pays sometimes 1/100th of a salary of a professional player.
An athlete, is paid to have fun. He is paid to play something he grew up loving, it is a dream job. He spends almost as much time as a normal working person, but, in the end, he is just full of gaiety, doing what he loves best, and making a hell of a living out of it.
What is the difference? There would be none, if athletes got paid less than an average working person.
OK, it is not the biggest deal in the world if a top athlete was getting a couple million dollars in a year. I understand that. The teams need to pay that kind of money to get a player. But when you look at a guy like Barry Zito, heck, he was never even that good in my opinion, and he got $126 million! And people go insane when they win 126,000 dollars! It just doesn’t seem right to me, athletes getting paid too much.
Now I know there will be a lot of comments on this post saying that I am wrong- But just think about it.
I hope to hear comments from this blog not just saying that the idea was stupid, I am wrong, etc. I want to hear your thoughts- Why should athletes be paid so much? Why can they get more money than people who work hard, doing things much harder than playing basketball, or lifting weights.
It may sound disproportionate when compared to the salaries in the “real world”, but athletes’ salaries are so high because the amount of financial value they bring to their teams. The presence of someone like A-Rod on the Yankees team brings fans through the turnstiles, increases merchandise sales and sponsorship from outside companies, improves chances of winning prize money and generally just fills the cash registers on a daily basis. It’s the same reason that people like Brad Pitt can command squillions of $$$ per film… their presence in the film virtually guarantees it will make 10 squillions $$$ at the box office. It is only fair that they get paid accordingly, because professional sports is (regrettably) a business, not just a past-time, and they increase revenue enormously. Sure, they are some very mediocre players who benefit from this more than they should, but that is the result of clubs mis-spending their money, and this goes on in every business – I know people who earn £30k a year (c. $60k) and spend most of their time posting on internet forums and shopping on Ebay. But the general rule of capitalism is that people get paid according to their worth, and their worth is defined in terms of $$$ they generate. That’s why Joe Schmoe who works in accounts gets $50k a year… his presence their probably doesn’t do much for the company financially, and their share price sure didn’t rocket upwards the day they hired him!
And you are wrong when you say they are paid to have fun. I wish it were true, but it isn’t. They are paid to win games, and if they don’t then they won’t have a job.
It is supply and demand. Athletes realize how much money they bring in via TV viewers, fans visiting the game, etc. so they want a good chunk of the money brought in and as you can see it is a lot of money.
Jealous!
Hell yeah.
hey ..i’m doing an assignment on athlete salaries .. and ia lson agree with you on that they get paid WAYY to much ..