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Pay To Play Research Paper

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Pay to Play
Over 70 percent of full time employees work 40 hours or more a week (Wesley, Daniel). These individuals have what many would consider to be a job. So why is it when an athlete spends 40 or more hours a week dedicated to a sport it is considered anything less (Alessi, Dominic)? College athletes cannot be paid or accept any free merchandise of any sort because of rules currently set by the NCAA. The reason for this ruling is to keep the integrity of the “amateur” athletics. It’s an amazing fact that these “amateur” athletes find a way to bring in billions of dollars annually by just being mediocre at their trade. By this logic people should be lining up to buy season tickets to see their math teacher run a 7.2 forty yard dash or pull …show more content…

The money is made from the selling of tickets and merchandise based on college athletes. But these athletes see none of the money. Is it fair for a group of people to be exploited through a system in which they receive little to nothing in comparison to what they are worth? The average value for a division 1 football player is $137,000 and the average value for a division 1 basketball player is $289,000(Alessi, Dominic.). If we compare this to the tuition for in-state schools then the athlete is being greatly under compensated. In a similar comparison value of the basketball player even if the athlete is given a full ride he is still worth much more money than the tuition. The University of Alabama alone is a very lucrative business like many other big name schools. The University of Alabama reported over receiving 143.3 million in athletic revenues. This is more money than all 30 of the NHL teams and more than 25 of the 30 NBA teams (Edelman, Marc.). The reason for this unequal distribution of wealth is that on the professional level the money is split between the coaches the faculty and the athletes. While in college none of that money goes back to the athletes. Because of the unevenly disturbed wealth to the athletes and the faculty, the highest paid public official in 40 of the 50 states is a head college football or basketball coach (Edelman, Marc.) College athletes should be paid because the …show more content…

This couldn’t be further from the truth in many cases. One thing everyone must remember is that nothing in life is absolutely free. Even the athletes who do receive full rides still have to pay anywhere from $3000-$5000 per year for expenses (O’Shaughnessy, Lynn). Full rides aren’t given out like lollypops, only a percentage of division 1 athletes receive one. The only division one sports that have the ability to offer full rides are: football, men and women's basketball, and women's gymnastics, volleyball, and tennis. A shocking and more surprisingly fact is that in these Division I sports, athletes receive a full ride or no money at all. Schools are only allowed so many scholarships. This means not all the athletes get a scholarship, much less a full ride, and they sacrifice time that could be used for school, on the their given sport and still have to pay tuition. On average a division 1 athlete will receive $13,821 for men and 14,660 for women (O’Shaughnessy, Lynn). These values are much lower than the cost for any division one school’s tuition. It is clear to see that by no means all division 1 athletes receive a free education. But let’s take a look at the education they receive. An athlete’s education is greatly stunted by sports. Most people did some extracurricular after school in high school, imagine how it affected your studies

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