Should college athletes be paid - Research Paper Example

? Should College Athletes be paid? I do believe that college athletes should be paid and thispaper will talk about the issues that exist between colleges and athletes regarding paying to college athletes. Mainly it will focus on the strengths and positive points of paying to college athletes as they are definitely stronger then the negative ones. Since a long time, college athletes have been working with their hearts and souls day after day and year after year for the appreciation and name of their universities. The athletes are bringing huge money in their universities by their outstanding performances, television contracts and other deals. People, who are intrinsically motivated, possess the love for their work and they do not depend on any extrinsic reward for showing good performance. One can easily put athletes in this category. However, taking wrong advantage of this intrinsic motivation is common in most of the universities and colleges in the world (Byers and Hammer, pp.67-89). The people running these universities assume that provision of education in exchange of their phenomenal performance in sports is enough but this scholarship is not enough for those who give up their freedom and blood for a one-hour game. Apart from scholarship, they get nothing for their perseverance and struggle. If one goes in depth of this issue, one comes to know that athletes are responsible for running a huge business for the colleges and universities. Athletes play the same role for colleges as employees for organizations. One would hardly find any organization, which pays nothing to its employees who bring in a lot of business. Many people argue that it is more than enough if they get scholarship in exchange of their games and practice but the question arises, that can they survive on the scholarship money wholly. Scholarship money includes their college fee, tuition fee, and cost of books but what would they do for their food, entertainment, phone bills, laundry, and many other activities. Had they not been playing for the colleges they would do part time jobs and earn their livings but athletes require a huge time for practice without which they cannot give good performance and get scholarship from college. Scholarship is not just enough for what they give to their colleges. This is causing many athletes leave their colleges without completing their education and getting into professional sports. Many colleges give bonuses to its teachers and scholars out of the money, which actually comes in because of undying energy and struggle of college athletes. Chris Weber is one of the athletes of University of Michigan; he had to struggle for money to watch a movie on the other hand the university bookshop was selling his uniform jersey for $50. College athlete must receive some sort of payment from the colleges they join or from the NCAA itself. Colleges should treat athletes as humans as they treat every other student. By not considering them the major reason of earning money and refusing to pay, the NCAA and its executives want the athletes to live a life which normal human beings cannot live. Normal humans want return of their efforts and NCCA is not giving this return. Some or other way NCCA itself is putting the college athletes at a disadvantage to not finish their college education and ruin their careers. Many people say that system is fine the way it is and there is no need of paying college athletes but they would understand the scenario only if they were at the place of these unfortunate athletes. One of the clearest examples of exploitation of college athletes is that of NCCA, which signed a contract of one billion dollar with CBS giving them right to broadcast all NCCA basketball tournament games played by their college athletes. Moreover, “NCAA has a multimillion-dollar yearly budget and it earns over $20,000,000 a year in television contracts” Murphy and Pace, n.p.). Concerning this, Hunter R. Rawlings III, president of the University of Iowa, has suggested, “Television controls university athletics”. Local television coverage also contributes enormously in generating revenue for the colleges and universities (Murphy and Pace, n.p.). Apart from these revenues, successful college athletic programs use their recognized name and popularity for marketing of merchandise associated with sports and their university. They also generate revenues by increased enrolment of students in their universities because of huge fame of athletes. The people who are prime reasons of this huge revenue do not even get a small percentage of this amount. A university earning a lot on the expense of athletes is not the only reason why universities should pay to athletes. There are many other reasons, which make it necessary for colleges to pay athletes for playing. Firstly, many universities do not allow athletes to work, as they have to give a lot of time to practice for games, so without work how would they pay for their expenditures if universities do not pay them. This also causes athletes to get illegal money, cars, bikes, and other stuff. Athletes acquire shortcuts to earn money, they might involve in some sort of match fixing and go against their own college (Knapp, Rasmussen, and Barnhart, pp.20-23). They can also involve in drugs, and other activities, which contribute in increment of black money in the economy. Athletes sometimes have extra time to work and some universities also allow them to work and if they earn in that time they have to forgo delicious meals, stylish clothes and other necessary and luxury items because they have to save money for their future as they do not always get extra time. Many athletes do not make athletics as their profession and when they enter into corporate world, they have to go through a tough time. Because, they neither have good academic results as they were focusing more on games. Nor they have enough work experience in firms and organizations, as colleges did not allow them to work. This proves to be very demolishing for the future of athletes and becomes an advantage for non-athletes. Therefore, universities should give athletes a good pay so that during the studies they do not have any tension of money and can pay complete attention to their studies. This would not make them suffer in the real world and face failures. Moreover, if universities do not agree to pay athletes they should at least allow them to work so that they have work experience and their future does not spoil. Giving payment is better than allowing them to work because work might make them very busy, as they have to give time to studies and play as well, so doing an extra work might be very tiring for them. The University of Miami got around 8 million dollars for the Miami Hurricanes playing in the Nokia Sugar Bowl. The attire also brought in a lot of money by selling jerseys, hats, and footballs. Moreover, there are 60,000 people in Orange Bowl and they sell tickets at an average rate of 20$ each. Schools should pay the players some of this money because this is their prime right and if players start rebellion as the awareness is increasing day by day, colleges would not be able to make much profits from athletics. Paying athletes is good for every one because it would not make them leave their studies in between and go for sports. Acquiring sports as a career is not bad, instead it is very bright field, but leaving studies in between can be very damaging for individuals. Sports is a very risky field as there is no certainty of winning a game, moreover, it requires physical strength and energy (Zimbalist, 2006). Due to anything if a person loses these characteristics, he would be of no use in the field of sports, in such a time his qualification, education and mental abilities would not leave him alone and make him earn at least something for his family and himself. Owners and executives of universities should not only think about the prosperity of their colleges and universities, they should care about those individuals who are contributing in this prosperity. They should keep in mind that their decision of not paying athletes could ruin the lives of athletes and leave them good for nothing. A survey on 458 college students’ on their insights about paying to collegiate athletes suggested that students were completely in favor of paying their college athletes. “The survey also indicated that cash payments should come from universities’, general funds, shoe and television contracts, athletic departments, and even increased tuition fees received by universities and colleges. This research proves that college students value their athletic teams and understand their hardships more than the ones who actually should” (Schneider, pp. 6-7). Millions of Americans every year watch college football and basketball, encouraging their favorite universities just as they cheer on professional sports teams. In fact, the college athletics is nearly in differentiable from professional sports games. According to columnist Joe Nocera of New York Times, college football and basketball generate more revenue than National Basketball Association. Concerning this statement Nocera suggests that colleges must pay athletes. The American colleges for proving that not paying money is good for the athletes say that money apart from scholarship does not create any motivation for athletes and that their prime priority on the campus should be their classrooms. They further say that provision of scholarship is just a gesture of support from the college, they neglect all the time that athletes give on practice and all the other difficulties of athletes. As far as small games are concerned, one can agree partly that college should not pay them. However, the big football and basketball players who forget every other thing and give 50 to 60 hours a week to their practice must get payments from the college as a reward and compensation for what they missed while practicing for the good of college. The difference between the amount of money colleges generate from athletics and what athletes get out of it is so big, it is almost illegal. Many of the students playing college football and men’s basketball come from underprivileged homes (Griffin, pp. 109-220). The lure of money is strong. If students have nothing and they see that their college is making something from them, they will have a fire ignited in them and would do something that would either dump college into some big problem or dump their own selves in some big problem. Universities give out scholarships to all kinds of students, not only athletes. Students with exceptional educational records, students with an outstanding talent and students with financial need get money for their tuition fees at many universities. Mostly students do not get full scholarship but universities have different kinds of financial assistances for different reasons. These students do not earn any money for their universities in return of which they get scholarships, they just get it for their own personal reasons. On the other hand, College football and basketball players do earn money for their college in larger proportion. If one ponders over this scenario, one would question about the difference between those who earn for college and those who do not (Sack and Staurowsky, pp. 33-108). If colleges at least ponder over this question and if they are fair in making their decisions they would definitely agree upon paying athletes. Colleges require college athletes to play one year before they go professional, colleges say that they have this requirement because they want athletes to practice well before they start their career however many people deny with this statement. Colleges have many benefits of it, firstly if after one year an athlete of a college goes professional and becomes successful, it is a matter of pride for colleges and they can easily attract other athletes and start exploiting them by saying that this successful athlete belongs to their college. Secondly, colleges can auction the sports materials used by them such as t-shirts, balls, shoes etc. Colleges can earn a huge amount of money from these auctions because a college sport is not less popular than the professional sports. People are die-heart fans of college athletes and they would give a huge amount of money to get the possession of sports materials of their favorite athletes (n.d, 2010). Colleges can go to the extent of getting the credits for success of athletes and this would rank them high among all the colleges. This is just another way of earning money through these athletes and not giving them the share. If one talks about the ethics of sports, it is a rule in many sports that an athlete gets a salary, which is equivalent to marginal revenue of a product. This means that the total amount generated by a win in multiplied to contribution of athlete in that win. This contribution varies from sports to sports, in cricket, contribution might be in the terms of making more runs or letting the other team not make more runs by doing good fielding and reducing their wickets. In football, this contribution would be in terms of making goals and not letting other team make goals. There are different kinds of contribution for different kinds of sports however one cannot deny the costs, which are incurred in getting these athletes prepared for such wins. Colleges have complete rights to reduce these costs from the amount of wins generated by the athletes. However, if colleges give a justification that costs are very high then this thing cannot be agreed upon because no one is such fool to invest on something, which is not lucrative. Obviously, the see high returns from these training therefore they invest otherwise they would not. Colleges should pay athletes because not only athletes deserve it or they work hard or they are profitable for colleges but also because it is included in the ethics of sports, it does not matter if it is a college sports (Parent, 2004). Many people think that paying athletes would exert a pressure on them to win and they would not perform well under pressure but this is actually not the case. If a person is not valued for his efforts, he would ultimately stop making efforts. Ethics do not only exist in sports but in every profession it is prime duty of employer to pay the employee for his efforts, agreeing on the fact that athletes are not employees one cannot deny that they do more than what employees do. They promise a huge amount of money not with words but with their courage and performance, which employees cannot even promise but try. If currently colleges and universities do not understand the importance of paying to their athletes, in future they would have to pay for the same. If the scenario goes on like this, colleges would have less passionate athletes who could bring revenues and profits for the colleges. Even if there would be athletes, they would charge higher stipends because this issue is getting importance now and athletes are becoming more aware of their rights regarding their work. Conclusively, this paper gave an insight into the ethical notions existing between athletes and colleges, and it gave many evidences, which proved that idea of paying to college athletes is correct because its advantages are more for every individual of the society. It reflects the notion of equality, human rights, value of hard work and most importantly significance of justice in the society. It would give courage to athletes and prevent occurrence of such issues in future in which people do not get what they deserve. Works Cited Byers, Walter and Charles Hammer. Unsportsmanlike Conduct: Exploiting College Athletes. University of Michigan Press, 1997. Griffin, Geoff. Should College Athletes Be Paid? Greenhaven Press, 2007. Knapp, Terry J., Rasmussen, C., and Barnhart, Roger K. “College students (Surveys) College Sports (Surveys).” College Student Journal (2001): 20-23. Murphy, Steve and Jonathan Pace. “A Plan for Compensating Student-Athletes.” Volume 18, Issue 3. n.d. “Project Innovation.” "Paying College Athletes." College Student Journal. Volume 35, (2010): 129-234. Parent, Christopher M. "An Analysis of Whether Student-Athletes Should Be Paid." Forward Progress. (2004): 226-256. Sack, Allen L. and Ellen J. “Staurowsky.” College Athletes for Hire: The Evolution and Legacy of the NCAA's Amateur Myth. Greenwood Publishing Group, 1998. Schneider, R. G. "College Students’ Perceptions on the Payment of Intercollegiate Student-Athletes." College Student Journal. (2001): 6-7. Schneider, R. G. “College Students’ Perceptions on the Payment of Intercollegiate Student-Athletes.” College Student Journal. (2001): 6-7. Zimbalist, Andrew S. The Bottom Line: Observations and Arguments on the Sports Business. Temple University Press, 2006. Read More