Summary: College Athletes Should Be Paid

Throughout the years college sports have been about the love of the game, filled with adrenaline moments. However, the following question still remains: Should college athletes get paid to play sports in college? Seemingly, this debate has been endless, yet the questions have gone unanswered. The National Collegiate Athletics Association (NCAA) plays a vital role in this debate. The NCAA is a billion dollar industry, but yet sees that the athlete should get paid for their hard work and dedication.

College athletes are taken advantage of and deserve to be compensated for their services while playing sports. These students are exploited and used to make money and out of everything that particular school makes, the athlete never given a penny of it. All of the hard works, blood, sweat and tears that they put into that

Thesis: College athletes deserve be paid because they invest a lot of time, work and take significant risks but do not receive enough of the money they generate for the NCAA and schools.

With the universities pulling in more than twelve billion dollars, the rate of growth for college athletics surpasses companies like McDonalds and Chevron (Finkel, 2013). The athletes claim they are making all the money, but do not see a dime of this revenue. The age-old notion that the collegiate athletes are amateurs and students, binds them into not being paid by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). This pay for play discussion has been talked about since the early 1900s but recently large steps are being made to actually make a change. There are many perspectives on the payment of collegiate student athletes coming from the NCAA, the athletes themselves, and the university officials.

In recent years mixed feeling have been discussed over college student athletes getting paid. Some feel that players should be rewarded for the huge amount of revenue generated on behalf of their play. Especially when coaches are receiving huge multi million dollar contracts. Currently, NCAA rules do not allow players to receive any compensation. The non-fiction article, “Should College Player get Paid?”, written by Michael Gonchar, explains how NCAA classifies Division I football players as amateurs, not professionals, student-athletes, not employees, which is how colleges get away with paying them nothing. With respect to how hard and how much time college athletes put in, college football players should not get paid due to scholarships, playing is a privilege not a job, and money allocation . They should how ever be compensated, such as

After all, these athletes are attending their respected school on a scholarship because of their talent, but what happens when that talent can no longer be used? What happens when an athlete is no longer able to share their talent due to an injury or other medical condition? In such circumstances where an athlete is no longer able to play due to a career ending injury, the individual loses their scholarship. Now, not only will the individual have to pay for a surgery, but also the rest of their tuition. According to an article in The New Yorker “Why NCAA athletes shouldn’t be paid” written by Ekow N. Yankah,"The athletes in major football and men’s basketball programs are disproportionately black, many from poor and educationally disadvantaged backgrounds”

College sports players gain so much revenue which, as resulted from the (NCAA) National Collegiate Athletic Association. Due to, this situation rising over the few past decades. Participating colleges have caused such debate in whether college athletes should be compensated.

Although I believe athletes should be paid, not everyone sees eye to eye with me. Title IX is a law that enforces all collegian athletes are not allowed to be paid for playing for the school. They say that athletes already receive money from athletic scholarships

Undoubtedly, there are numerous perspectives around the world on whether or not college athletes should be paid. The National Collegiate Athletic Association currently enforces a strict policy regarding the way college athletes receive benefits. If individuals are supplying certain collegiate athletes with benefits they should not, the NCAA tries to find the source and eliminate it immediately. These punishments are often harsh and can lead to an extermination of a sports program for a certain amount of time, even if only one person is to blame. There are experts in the world that fight against the rules of the NCAA because of the strict of punishments they give out. Experts also wish for these athletes to be paid because of the revenue

Wall Street Journal asks “Should college athletes be paid?”. The question colleges are arguing about. College athletes that don’t have a scholarship should be paid because they are doing work without a reward. If they don’t want to pay them, pay their college and it will be better. About half of college athletes don’t get any financial aid. Why are they doing work without any reward? College athletes are being paid illegally. Most americans can’t afford college and drop out because of the cost. ESPN said “The United States finished last (46 percent) for the percentage of students who completed college once they started it” (ESPN). It all started 43 years ago when the first scholarship limitation was put.

Some say college student-athletes should not be paid argue that they receive scholarships as a form of payment for their talents. (4) Others might say that being a college student-athlete is a full-time job, bouncing between the weight room, the court/field, classes, and film sessions. (4) Some of these extracurricular activities cause the students to miss class, and make millions of dollars for the league. (4) Since some of these student-athletes are making money for a place, missing school while doing it, they should surely make something off of

Colleges give athletes the opportunity to play sports at the highest level possible while making a constant progress towards a degree. According to the statistics, these colleges earn a huge amount of money from letting these athletes perform. As an example the NCAA and CBS/Turner sports had a $10.8 million deal for televising march madness during 2011-2014. The enormous amount of money received by the NCAA have turned into the controversy if athletes should be rewarded with money, or with a full-time scholarship during a period of 4 years. My proposal is to not pay college players, because even though they spend a ton of time working hard to perform well, and they miss college classes; an average college player in division I receive a full-time

There is a strong side to why college athletes should not get paid for playing, but there is a much weaker opposition for the argument that college athletes should be paid. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but it sounds empty-headed and upright foolish to believe that college should deserve a contract that will pay them for all the work they have done in sports. A different viewpoint is some athletes need the money to support their families as this was always their motive and the professional leagues may not work out for them due to injuries or poor choices. An intriguing outlook on this scenario “Thirdly, for those who do not plan on playing professionally, college athletics is an avenue for them to receive a free education should they be rewarded a scholarship. Athletes are provided with a free education that allows them to increase their labor supply in non-athletic markets after graduation, without having to bear the typical education costs that other students must pay.”

College athletes should be paid because slavery has been abolished in our country. I am comparing the hard work these kids do for no pay to slave labor. Slaves were forced to work against their will and the same thing happens to these athletes. The athletes need money to eat and do laundry but they do not have the time to get a job. School and sports are both full time jobs. Especially a college sport. That is the second highest level of sports in the U.S. They need to put all of their focus on the sport they play. A job would just distract them from their art, and a distraction would be bad. I’m sure their coaches wouldn’t appreciate them working at a place.

            If college students are spending their time playing these sports and not working, they should be getting paid for it. Not only are these students forfeiting their time to study, talk to friends, and even relax after classes, but they are missing an opportunity to have jobs. “Players’ relationships to the school they play for should be spelled out in an individualized pay-for-service contract rather than an NCAA-standardized letter of intent that impinges on basic freedoms” (Marx, 475). The NCAA requires that students are enrolled full time and play football to gain the scholarship offered. There is an argument by Hartenstine on this subject that “Some 15 percent played professional football as a first career, but 15 percent were corporate executives, 13