SHOULD COLLEGE ATHLETES BE PAID?

Should College Athletes be Paid?

Matthew Jacobs

AP English 4

Research Paper

Clyde A. Erwin High School

SHOULD COLLEGE ATHLETES BE PAID? 2

Some people think that if the players can bargain over their working conditions, they

will want to be paid, just as professional athletes are. And this may change college sports

forever(https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/kidspost/should-college-athletes-get-

paid/2014/04/09/5cfb4b2c-bf36-11e3-bcec-

b71ee10e9bc3_story.html?utm_term=.ee649b2bd27f). In this research paper the reader should

hope to learn enough information about college athletes and the NCAA, to then be able to come

up with an opinion of their own of whether or not college athletes should be paid.

So, should college athletes be getting paid to play college sports? To start off there are a

lot of different factors to take into consideration. Such as the fact that college athletes get paid in

the form of scholarships, it depending on the sport, the fact that NCAA executives and coaches

make as much as seven figure salaries, the NCAA itself being a billion dollar organization, that

athletes are putting their physical health on the line, and also that paying college athletes would

change the overall competition in college sports.

What is the NCAA? The NCAA stands for the National Collegiate Athletic Association,

and so basically this huge organization regulates the athletes in over a thousand different

institutions, and it also organizes the athletic programs for the collegiate athletes to compete, in

either division one, division two, or division three. The NCAA is considered a non-profit

organization, meaning they put all of their revenue back into the schools, championships,

coaches, scholarships, and equipment/stadiums. And although they put all of their revenue back

into these things for the student athletes, they still raise on average, just over a billion dollars per

year.
SHOULD COLLEGE ATHLETES BE PAID? 3

Some/a lot of college Athletes do get paid by means of free education. When you think

about it, often times, and depending on the sport, and the caliber of the player, college athletes

are making a lot of money by means of scholarships. The average class of 2016 graduate has

$37,172 in student loan debt (https://studentloanhero.com/student-loan-debt-statistics/). Meaning

that if a college athlete gets a full ride scholarship (which is very rare), on average, theyre

saving themselves $37,172 in student loan debt, even though they could also potentially be

saving themselves a lot more than that. While saving themselves $37,172 in student loans that

they would otherwise be in debt from sounds pretty nice, how does it compare to being a

professional and seeing it as a job? Well if the athlete is being paid $37,172 in a full ride

scholarship, that means that they would be getting paid $9,293 per year of college. And since

being a college athlete is basically a full time job as it is with sports and school, its seemingly

impossible for an athlete to find other ways to make money while being on the team.

While these statistics make it out to sound like college athletes are getting paid a decent

amount of money, these statistics were purely based on full-ride scholarships, which as said

before, is very rare. The average mens athletic scholarship in the NCAA is $14,270, and thats

just for their tuition, it doesn't take in the cost for housing, a meal plan, and expensive textbooks

into account.

One other interesting point to paying college athletes with a salary instead of by means of

scholarship to where they can then pay for their college and also have extra money as well, is

that if colleges were to do this, then the money would be taxed, leaving both the athletes and the

colleges with less money for the athletes.

SHOULD COLLEGE ATHLETES BE PAID? 4

It depends on the sport. The majority of athletes getting full-ride scholarships are your

big sport athletes that bring in big crowds, such as in men's basketball and football. Other sports

such as soccer or wrestling persay, dont attract crowds or money anywhere near close to that of

the bigger sports, and therefore, these athletes dont get as much money in scholarships. Also,

because womens sports dont typically get the crowds that mens sports do, even in the bigger

sports for women, they dont bring in anywhere near as much money either, and loose

scholarship money because of it too.

Because of the fact that most of the money the NCAA is making is from basketball and

football, this most likely means that if college athletes were to get paid, then the bigger sport

players would make more money, and athletes/teams that have had more success will be paid

more than the others with less success (.https://www.collegexpress.com/articles-and-

advice/athletics/blog/should-college-student-athletes-be-paid-both-sides-debate/).

Another big point to how it depends on the sport, is the difference in the amount of

scholarships colleges can give for certain sports. For big sports like football, with the crowds that

they bring in and the viewers they get on television, along with the overall huge size of the

roster, football can give away as many as eighty five scholarships to athletes per year. Whereas

other sports like soccer, which is also a team sport, can only be able to give away as little as less

than ten scholarships away to athletes per year (https://smartasset.com/retirement/should-student-

athletes-be-paid).

NCAA Executives and Big Sport coaches often times make as much as a million dollars

or more for their season alone. Thats right, athletes in the NCAA on average, getting
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scholarships as little as fifteen thousand dollars are being coached and have executives that make

as much as a million dollars or more. Thats more than sixty six times as much as the average

NCAA college athletes scholarship. Is one Coach or executive really worth more than sixty six

athletes?

Its not very hard for one tell that the money isnt being spread out very equally. Coach

John Calipari, the head Coach of the University of kentucky makes five and a half million dollars

in one season of basketball, making almost fourteen times as much as the President of the United

States makes. Calipari isnt alone either, seventeen other NCAA basketball coaches, and seven

NCAA football coaches all make over three million dollars per season.

(https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/kidspost/should-college-athletes-get-

paid/2014/04/09/5cfb4b2c-bf36-11e3-bcec-

b71ee10e9bc3_story.html?utm_term=.ee649b2bd27f). Coaches have a big effect on the games

and the overall season for the team, but its up to the athletes to actually get it done, and when

the team breaks records or defeats big teams, coaches get bonuses while the athletes dont get

anything (https://www.huffingtonpost.com/tyson-hartnett/college-athletes-should-be-

paid_b_4133847.html) .

The NCAA is a billion dollar organization, meaning athletes bring in a lot of money. The

schedules of the NCAA tournaments require an extended period in which the student-athletes

must miss school. Not only do they miss class, but they are absent for nationally televised games

that make a lot of money and receive millions of viewers.

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The profits/revenue being brought in because of college athletes is mainly going back

into the sports, and not into academics. Instead its going back to the coaches, directors, and

executives, who are making seven figure salaries. Student-athletes do not need to receive huge

salaries like their coaches; rather, they could still be paid a reasonable amount relative to how

much the program makes. Scholarships often cover most of the student-athletes books and room

expenses, but even a few extra hundred or thousand dollars per year could compensate for the

lack of time these students have to earn spending money at a regular part-time job, or by also

giving out more full-ride scholarships (https://www.collegexpress.com/articles-and-

advice/athletics/blog/should-college-student-athletes-be-paid-both-sides-debate/).

Mainly for March Madness alone (one of the most watched sporting events in the

country for college basketball), CBS and the NCAA made an eleven billion dollar agreement for

the games from 2011 to 2024. And yet the money being made off this event is not trickling down

to the players, who are the stars of the tournament.

If some of this money were to trickle down to the players, then it would also give the

players a source of financial security in having to learn to deal with their money as a professional

player would, and it would teach them to have to make financial decisions for themselves before

its too late (https://smartasset.com/retirement/should-student-athletes-be-paid).

Athletes put their bodies/physical health on the line. Being a college athlete isnt exactly

like being a recreational one, athletes are expected to put as much as forty or more hours of time

into their sport per week (http://www.businessinsider.com/college-student-athletes-spend-40-

hours-a-week-practicing-2015-1). Forty hours a week is what most people spend working at their

jobs alone! Not only are collegiate athletes expected to have to focus on their sport for just as
SHOULD COLLEGE ATHLETES BE PAID? 7

long as most people spend on working all week, but they also have to go to class on top of that.

With that being said, is it fair that collegiate athletes get paid less than the average person

working forty hours per week does, if they have to train in the exact same amount of time as they

work, plus go to school on top of that?

Spending forty plus hours a week on sports isnt just hard on athletes spare time, its also

extremely hard to be putting that much stress on their bodies. On average, in one year, twelve

thousand five hundred injuries occur to college athletes in the NCAA. Some of these injuries

aren't so serious, whereas others are as serious as never getting to play sports again.

So what about if an athlete has a severe injury? Although rare, severe injuries do happen,

and sometimes prevent players from playing their sports ever again, and when this happens their

scholarships go away as well, completely changing their futures. Whereas if these athletes were

getting paid to play, theyd have money to help them/help them stay in school even after these

career ending injuries, giving them a little more financial security. College athletes are

sacrificing their bodies and physical health on the line every time they play in these big games,

and although these severe injuries are more rare, theyre facing the chance of ending their careers

in hopes to possibly make it to the professional level.

Another big point to this debate is how it would effect how the college players play, and

also how the fans would react. One of the big reasons why college sports fans love college sports

over watching professionals is because of the competition in college. While these collegiate

athletes are still in school/college and havent made it professional yet, it makes the players

strive to get to that level, and earn their way through college and get to their dreams. If college

athletes were to be paid, it could ruin the whole dynamic to how college players play, because

since they would be getting paid to play, they would technically already be professionals, and the
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competition just wouldnt be the same. Also if this were to happen, the NCAA and other

broadcasting companies that depend on college sports to make money would most likely lose

viewers, and therefore money.

The final point to add to the research over whether or not college athletes should be paid

is simply how hard it would be for colleges and the NCAA to find a way to manage to pay

college athletes. Finding a compromise where athletes could be paid would bring up a lot of

other questions, like how the difference in sport would affect the athletes, where the money

would come from, if it would be the NCAAs job or the schools, how much should the athletes

be paid, and if it would affect the players and therefore fans/viewers.

Bowen, Fred. College Sports Can Bring in Big Money. Should Athletes Get Some of It? The

Washington Post,

WP Company, 9 Apr. 2014, www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/kidspost/should-college-

athletes-get-paid/2014/04/09/5cfb4b2c-bf36-11e3-bcec-

b71ee10e9bc3_story.html?utm_term=.b3c6957e2202.

Hartnett, Tyson. Why College Athletes Should Be Paid. The Huffington Post,

TheHuffingtonPost.com, 21 Oct. 2013, www.huffingtonpost.com/tyson-hartnett/college-

athletes-should-be-paid_b_4133847.html.

Martinez, Madisen. Should College Student-Athletes Be Paid? Both Sides of the Debate.
SHOULD COLLEGE ATHLETES BE PAID? 9

CollegeXpress, Carnegie, 20 Mar. 2017, www.collegexpress.com/articles-and-

advice/athletics/blog/should-college-student-athletes-be-paid-both-sides-debate/.

Patterson, Tiffany. Should College Athletes Be Paid? SmartAsset,

SmartAsset, 3 Feb. 2017, smartasset.com/retirement/should-student-athletes-be-paid.

Zimbalist, Andrew. Paying College Athletes: Take Two. The Huffington Post,

TheHuffingtonPost.com, 28 Mar. 2015, www.huffingtonpost.com/andrew-

zimbalist/paying-college-athletes-take-two_b_6961314.html.

Spiegel, Max. A Look at the Shocking Student Loan Debt Statistics for 2017. Student Loan

Hero, 13 Sept. 2017, studentloanhero.com/student-loan-debt-statistics/.

Jacobs, Peter. The Insane Amount of Time Student Athletes Spend on Practice. Business

Insider,

Business Insider , 27 Jan. 2015, www.businessinsider.com/college-student-athletes-

spend-40-hours-a-week-practicing-2015-1.