To Pay...Or Not To Pay?

Should College Athletes Be Paid for Play? [1]

By: Jason Rubinstein

If I told you your favorite college football team would have a perfect season, with a Heisman Trophy candidate quarterback and a coach of the year candidate, and would not see action in any post-season bowl game, you would call me crazy.

Ohio State beat Michigan on November 24, 2012 to cap
off a perfect 2012 season [2].

The UConn Women's basketball team has
generated millions of dollars of revenue for the University [3].

This past season, The Ohio State University fans watched their Buckeyes’ perfect 12-0 season come to an end -- without a berth to a bowl game. Ohio State was sanctioned by the NCAA for allowing its athletes to receive illegal benefits from school boosters. Many of you may be wondering "what's the big deal"? What's wrong with compensating collegiate athletes who are working hard to generate millions of dollars in revenues for their schools? This debate has dominated collegiate sports for decades.  So should college athletes be paid? The simple answer is "no". 

          College athletes do not deserve compensation beyond their academic scholarships because it would not be fair to the broader student and academic communities. Paying college athletes also would likely lead to discrimination against female athletes since female sports do not generate significant revenues, raising the serious question under Title IX of whether men should be paid for playing when women are not. 
          To decide what's fair and just, we should consider the teachings of Jeremy Bentham. Considered the founder of utilitarianism, Bentham was a proponent of utilitarianism as a measure of justice, seeking to give the greatest good to the greatest number [4]. Applying Bentham's reasoning, college athletes should not be paid. Paying them would only benefit the few (i.e., the athletes), and cause significant hardship to the far greater numbers of students and alumni who would be called upon to fund player salaries.  It would also fundamentally change the character of collegiate athletics, essentially turning student athletes into professionals.

            Critics argue that paying college athletes is fair because players are producing millions of dollars of revenue for their universities through ticket sales and multi-billion dollar television contracts. Michael Wilbon, a senior writer at ESPN, writes in his article College Athletes Deserve to be Paid: “So you know what caused me to do a 180 on the issue? That $11 billion deal -- OK, it's $10.8 billion to be exact -- between the NCAA and CBS/Turner Sports for March Madness between 2011 and 2024” [5]. 

"NCAA Moneyball"  [7]

Wilbon goes on to argue that because of the enormous revenue earned by the schools, it is only fair that players should get a slice.  According to Wilbon, “the people who produce the revenue share a teeny, tiny slice of it. That's right, football and men's basketball players get paid; lacrosse, field hockey, softball, baseball, soccer players get nothing” [6]. Well, Mr. Wilbon, while this might seem plausible at first, it is far more complicated than you make it out to be.  For example, many athletic departments do not produce significant revenues from which to pay college athletes, and thus would need to increase tuition or alumni donations to fund player salaries.  In fact, this would affect most schools. In an interview with 60 Minutes, University of Michigan Athletic Director, Dave Brandon, said that, “Out of 125 programs [Division I Colleges], 22 of them were cash flow even or cash flow positive” [8].

The University of Michigan Football team takes in more
than $90 Million dollars a year [9].

How could a school with no athletic revenues pay athletes? One  answer is that they shouldn't, and that only schools that generate such revenues should pay their athletes.  That, though, would destroy collegiate athletics by creating an uneven playing field. The universities that generate the most money would be able to get the best athletes, as they would get paid the most, much to the disadvantage of smaller Division I schools. Only a handful of schools would enjoy the benefits of paying college athletes. Applying Bentham’s principles, the greatest good would not go to the greatest number.  

Wilbon ought to think of the impact that paying college athletes would have on the greater student population. Students would face significant tuition increases to fund collegiate sports, including students who do not enjoy them.  Besides, college athletes already are in front of students financially because their room, board and tuition is fully paid for.  Dana O’Neil, a writer for ESPN, clearly demonstrates the significant benefits that collegiate athletes get over regular students in her article “The View from the Inside”. In my view, those benefits are sufficient to fairly compensate athletes for the benefits they generate for their universities. 

The issue of illegal music downloads can
relate to the issue of paying college athletes [10]

            The issue of whether or not to pay college athletes is perhaps relatable to other contemporary issues. For example, some might argue that paying collegiate athletes for their services is no different than stopping illegal music downloads and having to pay musicians for the work they do. As Chris Ruen writes in his article, The Myth of DIY, "If you find meaning and beauty from a musician's work and you want them to continue creating it-- then you are obliged to support them. If you like the idea of record stores, the people they employ, the values and spirit they promote-- then you are obliged to support them" [11]. Arguably the same holds true of college athletes given the value they generate for millions of people.  But as NCAA President Mark Emmert pointed out in his Outside the Lines interview  the situation here is very different since college athletes are not owners, sellers or even employees: they are students!  

            Paying college athletes would also undoubtedly create problems under Title IX.  For example, as Bill Plaschke, a writer for the LA Times, points out, "Do USC (University of Southern California) basketball players really deserve as much as USC football players? And if you don't think USC female athletes would demand--and receive - equal money, then you don't understand the concepts of gender equity" [12].  The plans that have been put forward to date do not include compensation for female collegiate sports since they do not generate significant revenues.  Such plans undoubtedly would face legal challenges under Title IX. 

Photo Taken from the cover of Sports Illustrated
from the May 7,2012 issue [14]

Joe Nocera presented such a plan to pay college athletes in the New York Times, but in the very same article he concedes that “There are almost surely Title IX issues surrounding my plan” [13].Whether such proposals are ultimately found to be illegal under Title IX, there is no doubt that such plans, if implemented, would be stuck in years of litigation.  The universities know this. Texas Southern University’s Athletic Director Charles McClelland, for example, has stated that, “I can't see the NCAA passing any legislation to allow additional pay just based on revenue-producing sports, knowing all the other sports would be adversely affected” [15].

          

It is time to bring this debate to a close, once and for all. Paying college athletes would cause far more problems than it solves.  It is neither fair nor just, and would create huge legal issues that would plague the NCAA and collegiate athletics for years to come. As Bentham said, we should focus on providing the greatest good to the greatest number. In this case, that would be best served by keeping collegiate athletics the way it is.             

----------------------------

[1] Photo from: George Dohrmann, Pay For Play in College Sports, 2011. http://insidesportsillustrated.com/2011/11/03/should-division-i-athletes-be-paid-si%E2%80%99s-proposal-for-how-it-could-work/#more-1641 

[2] Photo from: michiganjournal.org, 2012. http://michiganjournal.org/wp-content/gallery/michigan-v-ohio-state/michigan-ohio-state-04.jpg

[3] Photo from: Bob Child, AP Photo, 2011. http://connecticut.cbslocal.com/2011/03/14/uconn-hartford-in-round-one-of-womens-bracket/

[4] Bentham, Jeremy. "Of The Principle Of Utility." 1789. Updated 1907. http://www.econlib.org/library/Bentham/bnthPML1.html

[5]Wilbon, Michael. "College athletes deserve to be paid." July 18, 2011. http://espn.go.com/college-sports/story/_/id/6778847/college-athletes-deserve-paid 

[6] ibid

[7] Photo from: VUhoops.com, 2012. http://www.vuhoops.com/2012/07/02/is-fbs-really-a-bigger-risk/

[8] Keteyian, Armen, "Has college football become a campus commodity?" 60 Minutes. November 18, 2012, http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=50135410n

[9] Photo from: warsawsportsreview.com, 2012.http://warsawsportsreview.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/Michigan1.jpg

[10]Photo from: jakartaexpat.biz, 2011. http://jakartaexpat.biz/arts-entertainment/music-is-it-here-to-stay/

[11] Ruen, Chris. "The Myth of DIY." Toward a common ethic on Piracy. July 2009. http://www.tinymixtapes.com/features/myth-diy

[12]Plaschke, Bill. "Paying college players is an inherently bad idea." November 18, 2012. http://articles.latimes.com/2010/nov/18/sports/la-sp-plaschke-20101119

[13] Nocera, Joe. "Let's Start Paying College Athletes." December 30, 2012. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/01/magazine/lets-start-paying-college-athletes.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

[14] Photo from: sportsillustrated.cnn.com, 2012. http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/cover/toc/11734/index.htm

[15] Voepel, Mechelle, "Title IX a pap-for-play roadblock." July 15, 2011. http://espn.go.com/college-sports/story/_/id/6769337/title-ix-seen-substantial-roadblock-pay-play-college-athletics