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Who should get paid? Who shouldn't? Where should all the money go? Is it acceptable for student athletes to be paid in the form of tuition? Very few college football players end up going pro. But those who do quickly become multimillionaires. This is a light at the end of a tunnel many will never reach, which is why we give them an education in the event these kids are not the one in a million future nfl stars they all think they are. What this doesn't account for is the fact that it is virtually impossible to receive a quality education when you need to go to practice for hours every day. And if you stop playing the carpet is pulled out from under you financially. It's like a work study program except instead of sitting at the library front desk or working the register at the campus store for a few hours a week, you're working your body to its physical limits with a good chance of hitting your head and scrambling your brains every now and then. All the while the athletics department rakes in the moolah from TV deals and ticket sales and coaches end up lining their pockets. Clearly, the system is not ideal. But what is ideal? Should student athletes be paid? That would send them the wrong message about priorities. And talk about setting a precedent! Then colleges would have to start paying all the smarty arties who drive the average SAT up. In order to start paying student athletes, there would need to be a huge shift in how we think about them-- instead of being members of the student body taking part in an extracurricular they would be paid employees who also happen to take classes. I want to know what D&D thinks is the ethical solution to this dilemma. Theres so much money in college football in america, what do we do with it all! Maybe we should abolish the institution of college sports in America, that way we'll have fairness and equality for all.
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Nov 26, 2015 08:36
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As a non-american, isn't it simply better to have sports teams where people do sports, and colleges where people go to, you know, study? That's how it works in most countries, and it limd of makes more sense to me, though I can understand that the colleges are not happy about the idea to lose revenue. But really, shouldn't insitutes of higher learning be focused on just that, higher learning? E: so basically, break out the college teams as separate entities, and organize the sports stuff like any other sports league with franchises etc. lilljonas fucked around with this message at 09:21 on Nov 26, 2015 |
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Nov 26, 2015 09:04
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lilljonas posted:As a non-american, isn't it simply better to have sports teams where people do sports, and colleges where people go to, you know, study? There is too much money in it for it to go away. http://sports.usatoday.com/ncaa/finances/ E: Let's just get this in here too. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pX8BXH3SJn0 Bob James fucked around with this message at 15:52 on Nov 26, 2015 |
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Nov 26, 2015 15:47
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Bob James posted:There is too much money in it for it to go away. Let's put this here as well. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FuPeGPwGKe8
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Nov 26, 2015 16:04
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lilljonas posted:As a non-american, isn't it simply better to have sports teams where people do sports, and colleges where people go to, you know, study? Actually I would like to see European institutions to include sports activities much more into their everyday curriculum, much like the original Gymnasion idea in ancient Greece. On the other hand, college sports in the US is basically a professional, heavily commercialised sports industry and that stuff is ridden with corruption everywhere, so yeah, maybe not something you want to see as part of the education system.
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Nov 26, 2015 16:04
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I'll lay out the case against college athletics to anyone who'll listen, but am generally met with a shrug and a "Welp, that sucks. But that's the way things are. Too bad that it'll never change." Well, yeah, if you assholes just keep tolerating it.
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Nov 26, 2015 20:35
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lilljonas posted:As a non-american, isn't it simply better to have sports teams where people do sports, and colleges where people go to, you know, study? That's how it works with baseball. You're drafted out of high school and can play minor league ball and get paid until you get called up or you can play NCAA ball and get an education, then develop and get re-drafted in four years.
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Nov 26, 2015 21:30
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Bip Roberts posted:That's how it works with baseball. You're drafted out of high school and can play minor league ball and get paid until you get called up or you can play NCAA ball and get an education, then develop and get re-drafted in four years. That's still massively different than in most other countries. Athletes elsewhere do their sporting careers almost entirely at clubs, not in schools. But anyways the European sports system is so massively different to the US that you cannot really apply a lot of it. The NCAA problems need new solutions.
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Nov 26, 2015 21:44
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Milk Malk posted:Should student athletes be paid? That would send them the wrong message about priorities. What do you mean by this, exactly? quote:And talk about setting a precedent! Then colleges would have to start paying all the smarty arties who drive the average SAT up. We already do this in the form of merit scholarships, don't we? Also, gently caress Mark Emmert. Seriously, gently caress that guy. Here's the whole episode of Frontline's "Money and March Madness".
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Nov 26, 2015 22:33
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My inclination would be to push the system to an extreme: either drop the bullshit pretense that it's "amateur" sports and just start paying the players directly, or ban teams from having professional coaches altogether and place student athletics solely under the authority of student government.
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Nov 26, 2015 22:58
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Thanks for this. I didn't know Jon Oliver did an episode about this, it seems like a prime topic for him: easy outrage generator operating tangential to pop culture. Solkanar512 posted:What do you mean by this, exactly? Ostensibly, student athletes are hobbyists or "amateurs" who are first and foremost college students, but also happen to enjoy playing a game. It doesn't really work that way in the real world, but that's the layer of gloss that goes over everything. As for merit scholarships: that's exactly what I mean. We reward people for being exceptionally talented (whether at sports or academics) with a discount towards their education. When we begin to recognize that these amateurs are providing entertainment that rakes in millions, and make the decision to compensate them proportionally, that opens the door to other student groups demanding proportional compensation, like maybe a robotics team or a singing club. Again, thanks for the links. I figured this is kind of a tired discussion but I want to know where I can find out all of the obstacles to change that are keeping this hosed up system in place.
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Nov 27, 2015 04:50
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IF the NFL wants a minor league (and clearly it does), let them operate it at their expense.
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Nov 27, 2015 18:16
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Pope Guilty posted:IF the NFL wants a minor league (and clearly it does), let them operate it at their expense. Exactly this. Just to use Big 12 examples, the University of Texas' football team alone has a bigger operating budget than several of the other schools in the division's total endowment for academic spending. This while college costs continue to skyrocket. Utterly unethical, no matter how much I enjoy football.
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Nov 27, 2015 19:24
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Nobody's going to touch on the fact that these kids are basically consistently taking hits and brain damage and things that destroy their minds and bodies? Broken bones, concussions, internal injuries. And they're all expected to take this because without that football scholarship they aren't going to school? I basically am against football in general because the sport from the ground up is hosed up. Concussions are the norm, and players are pressured to keep on playing or 'walk it off' when their brain just got through slamming into their own skulls so hard it bruises. Hell the NFL basically fought tooth and nail to keep it a secret how much brain damage their players actually had. If they want to play a sport and get paid zillions of dollars for it, Fine. It's their choice, but I feel that students being told that this is the only way they're going to be able to go to school, by sacrificing their mental faculties and their bodies, is a form of coercion and shouldn't be tolerated.
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Nov 27, 2015 19:30
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Liquid Communism posted:This while college costs continue to skyrocket. Utterly unethical, no matter how much I enjoy football. That's not the unethical part, though, since most big teams like that are generating a profit and actually putting money back into the school. The unethical part is that the school is making large amounts of money off what is essentially free labour, and fairly dangerous free labour at that.
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Nov 27, 2015 20:50
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I should have elaborated, unethical because fora lot of the players, football scholarships are the only way they could afford a degree.
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Nov 27, 2015 20:55
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The money is too good for any meaningful change to be made at the college level. The avenue for change is going to be safety at the pee-wee/high school level and it won't be pretty getting there. We currently 'care' about safety because we tell ourselves that its just big hits/concussions and NFL careers that leave people wanting to suck start a shotgun, when unfortunately everything is pointing to cumulative low impact hits and the damage already being done by college, nevermind actually playing a single down in the NFL. Even then you're going to have massive backlash from parents who view their children's sports success as a direct reflection upon their own success in life. Really its just a modern day gladiator games complete with inevitable death.
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Nov 27, 2015 21:00
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Liquid Communism posted:I should have elaborated, unethical because fora lot of the players, football scholarships are the only way they could afford a degree. Ironically, gains to quality of life from their obtaining a degree are likely to be offset by effects of chronic traumatic encephalopathy.
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Nov 27, 2015 21:04
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I really like Johnny Manziel's approach to sport, and how much he angers ESPN stalwarts, (THE NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE).
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Nov 27, 2015 21:07
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PT6A posted:That's not the unethical part, though, since most big teams like that are generating a profit and actually putting money back into the school. Money that only goes to the athletic department.
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Nov 27, 2015 21:10
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American football needs a proper minor league like baseball or hockey. Student athletes who have a chance of going pro aren't doing poo poo with their "education". It's not right that they have to take 3-4 years of unpaid hits and risk injury to have a shot at playing sports. PT6A posted:That's not the unethical part, though, since most big teams like that are generating a profit and actually putting money back into the school. The unethical part is that the school is making large amounts of money off what is essentially free labour, and fairly dangerous free labour at that. Nope . And that article is only about football. All of the other athletic programs at practically every school lose all sorts of money.
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Nov 27, 2015 22:21
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And stop funding college football with students who want nothing to do with your colleges little game. So much has been pulled out of funding for football programs instead of proper classes and research.ChipNDip posted:Nope . Seriously, I'm so sick of the 'But, they bring IN money!' No, they don't. Even the NFL, who is BRINGING in money, gets a lot of their funds for their stadiums from local taxes through political deals, and the economic boost does not compare to the amount dumped into the stadium. Milk Malk posted:I want to know what D&D thinks is the ethical solution to this dilemma. Theres so much money in college football in america, what do we do with it all! Maybe we should abolish the institution of college sports in America, that way we'll have fairness and equality for all. There is so much money controlled by a select few, and most of that money is being taken from students and actual college programs/courses that NEED that money more than college football. CommieGIR fucked around with this message at 22:36 on Nov 27, 2015 |
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Nov 27, 2015 22:34
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CommieGIR posted:No, they don't. Even the NFL, who is BRINGING in money, gets a lot of their funds for their stadiums from local taxes through political deals, and the economic boost does not compare to the amount dumped into the stadium. I'm not an American and I've never been to the US but I can imagine that at least in some cities football is pretty much the only major cultural activity available. From this viewpoint it might be actually a bit more reasonable to publicly fund an NFL team, because without it the living quality would be worse for many people. Still not a reason to have it as part of the education system, of course.
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Nov 27, 2015 22:41
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I'm a Seahawks fan and everything, but calling pro football a "cultural activity" is a stretch. And I used to think that playing football taught leadership, but I don't think that's true. It teaches obedience, aggression and specific understanding of an extraordinarily complex subject, but there's nothing inherent to it that teaches how to apply the learning to other disciplines. If somebody is able to take broad lessons in leadership away from playing football, they probably would have been able to take the same lessons from volunteering or working at McDonald's. There's no value to football beyond creating great athletes and an entertaining spectacle.
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Nov 27, 2015 22:49
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CommieGIR posted:There is so much money controlled by a select few, and most of that money is being taken from students and actual college programs/courses that NEED that money more than college football. I had to drop out of college because my college decided to completely gut the film and journalism departments right before my senior year, leaving me without a real way to get a degree without spending another 2-4 years in college. But at least they got a new athletics facility.  Journalism became an elective. A loving elective. This is why our education is the worst in the world.
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Nov 27, 2015 22:50
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Honj Steak posted:I'm not an American and I've never been to the US but I can imagine that at least in some cities football is pretty much the only major cultural activity available. From this viewpoint it might be actually a bit more reasonable to publicly fund an NFL team, because without it the living quality would be worse for many people. Still not a reason to have it as part of the education system, of course.  Up until recently, the NFL was a 'Non-Profit' despite raking in billions yearly.And it really doesn't matter if it is a major cultural activity, I get that and that is not my problem with it, my problem with it is one of the most profitable sports out that asks for taxpayer money to build stadiums while promising a financial return on the taxpayers investment. But the evidence does not support that claim. Hitlers Gay Secret posted:I had to drop out of college because my college decided to completely gut the film and journalism departments right before my senior year, leaving me without a real way to get a degree without spending another 2-4 years in college. But at least they got a new athletics facility. They pulled funding out of the Nuclear Physics department at GTech to help fund a new school football initiative. 
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Nov 27, 2015 22:51
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CommieGIR posted:
Ok, that's lovely. I didn't know that.  In European soccer the teams that get help from public money are "at least" in most of the cases extremely indebted, though it's actually similarly scandalous.
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Nov 27, 2015 22:57
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Honj Steak posted:Ok, that's lovely. I didn't know that. The big problem too is the College Athletics departments claiming that their football programs are money makers, and then refuse to show how they can make money for the college while tuition skyrockets, tuition that includes a fairly hefty sports program fee as part of its percentage. There's an alternative argument that a successful college football program will draw in donors, the issue being any money donated tends to go directly to the athletics program and dean/board pay. You also had the recent issue in Wisconsin where the dipshit governor helped get funding for a massive new stadium while slashing college funding at the state level. CommieGIR fucked around with this message at 23:03 on Nov 27, 2015 |
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Nov 27, 2015 22:59
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Colleges dumping money into football at the expense of academics is not directly because of sports, but that colleges are hilariously for-profit institutions complete with former Fortune 500 executives running them. Even if sports weren't around they'd still be hiking tuition and gutting non-prestigious departments and pouring that money into something else that would get them a better return.
Proud Christian Mom fucked around with this message at 00:10 on Nov 28, 2015 |
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Nov 28, 2015 00:06
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go3 posted:Colleges dumping money into football at the expense of academics is not directly because of sports, but that colleges are hilariously for-profit institutions complete with former Fortune 500 executives running them. It doesn't help.
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Nov 28, 2015 00:09
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ChipNDip posted:Nope . That's a great article. It boggles my mind as to how all of these programs can be losing massive amounts of money, despite not paying the vast majority of their employees (the players). What state would their budgets be in if they had to pay players? In European rugby most 'academy' players, who would be somewhat equivalent to US college athletes in that they would be younger guys (18-23) not yet playing on the professional team, and who would still be in university studying, usually get paid a living wage of around $30-50k USD a year. They're not living like ballers but it means they don't have to worry about food, rent etc and they can save a little if they're smart with their money. Plus it means they're not being exploited for their labour with the slim chance of one day 'going pro' as their only reward.
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Nov 28, 2015 00:14
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ChipNDip posted:Nope . The figures they cited are for /all/ athletic funds and are only looking at individual years. 2014, for WVU for example, included payments to the Big East as part of our exit negotiations, we otherwise actually made money. And have very little in the way of "subsidy." Which CommieGIR referenced, though he somewhat exaggerates: atheletic fees, as % of total tuition are relatively small and they almost never go towards football programs at FBS schools (football programs, generally, are profitable if you're in the G5 -- see below) but instead pay the bills for everything else. The claim, specifically, he's talking about is the somewhat controversial claim about recruiting for non-athletes/visibility. On which the data is mixed. There is, sufficient evidence, to show that there are some benefits to athletic success, particularly for smaller schools without national namebrand. The bigger issue though, has to do with the disparities between the so-called "power 5" schools and everyone else. If you're in one of the group of five (the five strongest leagues in football, and more or less men's basketball) you're going to get something between 20-35m in T1 tv revenues and then additional if you get to sell your tier 3 rights. To put this in perspective, WVU from our media rights revenues alone, makes around 35--ish million a year. By contrast, down the road at Marshall, another D1 FBS program, their entire athletic budget is like 15-ish million, and their tv deal is something like 2-3m. The disparity gets even bigger when you look at the top 10 or so P5 programs, like Texas -- who are paid by ESPN to have an entire /network/ devoted to their sports. In that environment, where coaches are being paid millions and facilities are constantly needing to be upgraded, least you fall behind in the arms race and then not land a recruit, etc., it's easy to see why it's happening. Is there an easy solution? No. The biggest issue is cleaning up the NCAA and transforming it from a byzantine, feckless watchdog, into an organization that can effectively work to support athletes in a positive manner and keep a level playing field. But that's a much trickier, and lengthier post, than I am up for at the moment. One thing that could also help is partitioning D1 again between the Power 5 and everyone else. Though someone in TFF just got really mad at me for saying that without even reading it. So, good luck. Blut posted:That's a great article. It boggles my mind as to how all of these programs can be losing massive amounts of money, despite not paying the vast majority of their employees (the players). What state would their budgets be in if they had to pay players? Thety're not all losing "massive amounts of money" -- the chart just shows their total revenue and then if they're making money or not. But that said, new rules require them to basically pay a cost of attendance stipend -- essentially paying players -- though it's a far from perfect system, and there are already concerns about further disparities it could cause.
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Nov 28, 2015 00:21
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BI NOW GAY LATER posted:Thety're not all losing "massive amounts of money" -- the chart just shows their total revenue and then if they're making money or not. But that said, new rules require them to basically pay a cost of attendance stipend -- essentially paying players -- though it's a far from perfect system, and there are already concerns about further disparities it could cause. Wellllllll..... Its more to it than that. Only a select few colleges can actually pull off a profitable Football program: http://www.acenet.edu/news-room/Pages/Myth-College-Sports-Are-a-Cash-Cow2.aspx quote:Why? Cornell economist Robert H. Frank applied his concept of the “winner-take-all” market to college sports in a 2004 white paper for the Knight Commission. “Suppose 1,000 universities must decide whether to launch an athletic program, the initial cost of which would be $1 million a year,” Frank wrote. “Those who launch a program then compete in an annual tournament in which finishers among the top 10 earn a prize of $10 million each… How many schools will decide to compete?” quote:As munificent as this is, this kind of spending is typical of big-time college athletics programs at universities across the country. The Chronicle of Higher Education recently estimated that college athletics is a $10-billion marketplace. What sets UGA athletics apart is that it can pay for its expenses without turning to the university for help.
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Nov 28, 2015 00:34
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CommieGIR posted:Wellllllll..... No, he's talking about sports programs total -- not just football. There's a difference there. What I am saying is that football itself, as an enterprise, is generally break even or profitable, but the rest of the athletic budget isn't, and so they end up covering that. Now, the further distinction you can make, which I referenced earlier is that almost none of them, though, don't get some sort of subsidy from the academic wing.
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Nov 28, 2015 00:38
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Honj Steak posted:That's still massively different than in most other countries. Athletes elsewhere do their sporting careers almost entirely at clubs, not in schools. But anyways the European sports system is so massively different to the US that you cannot really apply a lot of it. The NCAA problems need new solutions. It's not that way by design. It happened largely by accident, entirely due to football. Originally, all sports were club sports or intramurals without much university involvement, based on the English prep school system. Athletics was something the undergraduates did for fun and was largely unregulated. Then in the 1870s they invented football at the northeastern schools. Initially, maybe a hundred students would show up for a game. Then the local population discovered it, and by 1880 fans flocked to the games by the thousands. By 1890 there were tens of thousands willing to pay enormous amounts of money (equivalent to over $1000 today) for the limited seats at the big games. They couldn't build wooden grandstands big enough to hold them all. In the 1890s football became a nationwide fad as every institution of any size wanted a football team of their own. So suddenly this undergraduate activity was making bucketfuls of money from ticket sales with no oversight or regulation from the faculty. There was no going back at that point, so faculties were forced to take over the governance of the programs and incorporate it into the university life, with football revenue able to pay for almost everything else. The NCAA appeared eventually to impose some order on the whole mess. Also, football was a huge financial boon to colleges. Relations with townsfolk improved immensely as the football games brought lots of revenue to the whole town. Alumni suddenly cared about their alma maters and would donate money to them. Students were better behaved due to the esprit de corps created by collectively screaming themselves stupid at the games. U.S. universities and athletics are essentially a marriage of convenience. There's not really any way to change it at this point.
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Nov 28, 2015 03:49
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Honj Steak posted:Actually I would like to see European institutions to include sports activities much more into their everyday curriculum, much like the original Gymnasion idea in ancient Greece. The American college system is also becoming increasingly corrupt and terrible in general. It's shifting away from "educate people to perform difficult, complex work" to "let's make as much money off of students as we possibly can."
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Nov 28, 2015 09:28
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ToxicSlurpee posted:The American college system is also becoming increasingly corrupt and terrible in general. It's shifting away from "educate people to perform difficult, complex work" to "let's make as much money off of students as we possibly can." You know most universities operate in the red, yes?
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Nov 28, 2015 15:31
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BI NOW GAY LATER posted:You know most universities operate in the red, yes? Universities are also coming under fire for spending money stupidly or hiring rear end loads of administrative staff for...who even knows what.
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Nov 28, 2015 19:33
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Pope Guilty posted:IF the NFL wants a minor league (and clearly it does), let them operate it at their expense. Blut posted:What state would their budgets be in if they had to pay players? Aside from that though, the only reason that head coaches are paid multi-million salaries in the first place is because they don't have to negotiate pay for players. If they did, it probably would wind up the same as pros where the players get paid substantially more and the current coaches would see massive pay cuts, but even something far less radical than that (like, say, requiring that Div I head coaches get paid no more than 4x the entire rest of the team combined) would be a massive improvement.
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Nov 28, 2015 20:35
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OneEightHundred posted:The irony behind this too is that the main thing preventing an independent minor league from being created is that the NCAA monopoly would refuse to cooperate with any such thing. There have been dozens of independent minor leagues through the years, all have failed financially because the NFL refused to fund then. It's got nothing whatever to do with the NCAA.
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Nov 28, 2015 20:40
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