Should College Athletes Get Paid?

College sports are one of the largest and fastest growing markets in today’s culture. With some college sports games attracting more viewers than their professional counterparts, the NCAA is one of the most profiting organizations in America. Recently there has been controversy in the world of college sports as to whether the college athletes that are making their universities and the NCAA money should receive payment while they are playing their respective sport. Many believe that these athletes should be paid. Others argue that they are already receiving numerous benefits for playing that sport from their universities. Many of the proponents of paying college athletes are current or former college athletes who believe their hard work and hours put into practice and competing go under appreciated. They feel that while the athletes are making the university money, the athletes do not receive any cut of these profits. Opponents feel that athletes already receive numerous perks and should not receive extra compensation on top of the perks they already receive.

Student athletes should not be paid. A misconception is that all athletic programs in the NCAA make head-over-toe profit. There are three divisions of intercollegiate athletics, and frankly division three athletic programs don’t make as much or have a profit when compared to division one programs. “Critics of paying college athletes note that only a small number of them compete in sports or on teams that actually generate revenue”. (Paying College Athletes) The truth is only a fraction of athletic programs are actually profitable, while most pose a cost to the institution. The question arises primarily in division one programs and typically in the sports of basketball and football. The argument is made that these institutions receive millions of dollars from their student athletes’ performance, in return they should be paid.

How in today’s society is it equitable to have a person perform labor, benefit off of their actions and that person not being compensated? Each year over 400,000 collegiate student-athletes both male and female, compete on 3 different division levels nationwide. During the lifespan of these athletes’ careers a select few become the face of their respective universities, who in turn generate uncountable amounts of revenue. Over the past couple of years the debate of paying college athletes has heated up and has been argued whether paying student-athletes would take the amateurism out of the game. Both ways they are involved and providing illegal services for cash to survive in a financially strapped economy. At what point does the NCAA

The existence of sports over the past 100 years has always been about support, excitement, and coming together as a team. The real question is, are student athletes actually playing for the “love of the game”? Even though college athletes provide entertainment for sport fans, they should not get paid because of many other privileges they receive. Student athletes are already compensated by the universities’ benefits. Sure, not every student athlete is on a full ride, but they are still receiving educational benefits and living expenses. They do not have to worry about money for textbooks, campus housing, meal plans, student loans and other student required responsibilities. Usually at bigger universities, if student athletes not doing well in that subject, they are required to go into one-on-one tutoring which is also free for them. Even while conditioning, student athletes are offered free professional physical therapy, athletic trainers, and

College sports are something that everyone has thought about, and many question whether or not they should get paid for it. Many Americans question whether or not it is right or wrong to pay college athletes to play sports. College athletes deal with a lot, from balancing classes to long practices in the evening. College is supposed to be a time when some individual figures out what he or she wants to do, but not for athletes. Most college athletes go to college on scholarships, giving them a full ride, but coaches think athletes are supposed to dedicate their life over to sports. I think college athletes should get paid because college is hard enough, and juggling a sport can add more stress to an athlete’s life. College athletes do more work than the people in the NFL and NBA. Being a college athlete is like being on a full-time job, because they dedicate their time and effort to that sport just like any person would on a job. College athletes should be paid because a sport is a full-time job, they devote so much time to it, and schools earn a lot of money off college athletes.

The first reason that athletes should be paid is that most of the money that a school makes comes from the athletes. Profits should be shared among those that actually do most of the work. A writer for Huffington Post writes, “As Rodney Fort, a sports economist and professor of sports management at the University of Michigan, succinctly put it, ‘The money is already there.’ The NCAA alone brought in nearly a billion dollars in revenue in its most recent financial year, and top-tier athletic programs regularly bring in tens of millions of dollars as well.(Strachan, 2015).” This quote states that the NCAA makes enough money and they can afford to pay their players. But aside from being affordable, what is also worth noting is that all current school athletes receive zero financial compensation for playing. Sports injuries are a real risk that these athletes take on every day. It is a risk that is not financially compensated by the school. A writer for Business Insider states, “In 2014, the ten schools that made the most money in college sports averaged $144.8 million in athletics revenue, $132.5 million more than the average those schools spent on scholarships, $12.4 million.(Gaines, 2015).” This quote states another reason why college athletes should be paid: schools make much more money than they spend on scholarships and the schools should use the remaining money to pay their players. Instead of using that money, they set that money aside to help pay for high administration salary and raises. Most of the

The topic I chose for my research paper is if college athletes should be paid. College

Centuries ago in the 1770s the first sport known as cricket originated in England. As time passed by more sports began originating in England such as football and basketball. These sports became very popular worldwide and were incorporated in Universities as extra-curricular activities. As more students started playing some students demonstrated more talent than others. One of the sports students played was football which in the United States college football became a national obsession. More people became intrigued by football and this sport began bringing a lot of money by filling up the stands. The issue of paying these athletes began arising, so the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) decided to give them a free education

There are a few things that separate professional athletes from college athletes. What separates them is that professionals receive money for their hard work and dedication to their specific sport. When you think about it, the professional athletes get paid for what they do best while the college athletes juggle academics, social life, jobs, etc. To me, that is absurd. However, college athletes are receiving pay for the time they spend playing their sports. The college athletes pay is actually an education. Therefore, despite the salaries of college coaches, the National Collegiate Athletic Association’s (NCAA) annual income, the responsibilities of

At a time when colleges all over the country are having to cut back on educational expenditures, justifying spending additional amounts of money on collegiate sports, as well as the players, has become a very hot pressed topic in which the collegiate athlete is losing out on much of the money generated by their performances either on the field or the court. Because many of these players help bring in money to the university, they believe that a portion of that money should be given back to them. Millions of dollars are made each year in collegiate sports but few of those dollars have been given back to the players, who are the one’s actually playing the sports colleges participate in. Merchandise with players names, video games using a player’s likeness, and all the obligations involving media interviews, as well as maintaining ones grades can cause a collegiate athlete to believe that their efforts are not being rewarded in a monetary sense. Now colleges and universities around the country are rebutting that argument by having all of the college athletes expenses paid for. They believe giving them a free education should be enough. Colleges believe that being a student should trump all other obligations, including sports, so helping a young adult pay for college is something universities hold in high regard. Universities are a place for higher learning, not a place where athletes are supposed to come and make money. Also, many colleges would have a burden paying their

Although coaches and staff can make millions of dollars, student athletes are playing sports but are students first; therefore student athletes should not be paid. They already receive payment by receiving scholarships, in many cases were college is already paid for. Colleges in different financial situations might have more or less of the ability of actually paying their

Ultimately colleges are to further educate students to help them achieve their dreams and goals in the future. “The first duty of a university is to educate, not to hire entertainers” said Krikor Meshefejian, a senior editor at the Journal of the Business Law Society. Many of the students, however, are only able to further their education by receiving some sort of scholarship in their sport. Even with these scholarships, students are not always able to fully cover the cost of their tuition, which may be driving some college athletes out of school early, or worse not going at all. If colleges would begin offering to pay student athletes for playing their sport this would help decrease the number of athletes who go to school for one year and then leave for the professional level. While there will still be

Are colleges athletes fairly compensated for their sacrifices as sports representatives of their universities? Although student athletes are offered full scholarships to cover most of their expenses, the debate whether they should be paid invites a tremendous amount of controversy. Professional and collegiate sports are viewed and highly favored nationwide and are highly profitable to the nation’s economy. The National Collegiate Athletic Association, NCAA, generates millions of dollars throughout seasons and bowl games in addition to their primary source of revenue accumulated from their television contracts the broadcast games

College sports have been growing in popularity over the last few decades. Every year, schools receive millions of dollars through intercollegiate athletics. The NCAA athletes provide entertainment not only to the schools that they attend, but also to millions of spectators around the world. The athletes are the ones who have worked so hard to acquire the revenue that colleges receive. Without them, none of this money would exist, so why shouldn’t they be paid? With so much money coming in, the athletes should be given a portion of the profit as a reward for how much time and energy they have put into their teams.

There has been much debate about whether or not collegiate level athletes should be paid for the work they put in for their team. These student-athletes are the major reason why colleges acquire the millions of dollars of revenue that they do. The names and faces of the more popular players in college sports are used for advertising quite often, so others believe that companies who use this method of advertising should share the profit they obtain with the player. Many do not realize the issues that could spawn from compensating athletes this young. Also, sports players are already being paid in scholarships.