Paying NCAA Athletes: Possible, and Necessary

The debate over whether NCAA athletes should be paid heats up in early spring every year. With the immensely popular March Madness basketball tournament just on the horizon, it’s easy to accuse the NCAA of unfairly profiting off of players who don’t get paid. Some argue in favor of paying student-athletes to give them a share of the billion-dollar college sports industry. They think the athletes deserve to reap the rewards of their work. These people have good intentions, but their solutions are impractical and unfair. Though some advocate for paying student athletes, the complexities and unwanted consequences of this proposal outweigh its surface level appeal.

There’s a common misconception that while the NCAA gains billions of dollars a year, college athletes get no compensation. Let’s put the existing compensation for student athletes into perspective.

Everyone knows that the college application process is one of the most stressful experiences in life. Starting from SAT II’s in freshman year to submitting Early Decision applications four years later, the idea of going to college is always lurking in the back of our minds. Even if we’re ultimately accepted into our dream university, the euphoria and excitement is often overshadowed by a more pressing issue: college isn’t cheap! According to the College Board, the average cost to attend a private, four-year college is $32,410 per year. All in all, we’d expect to pay well over $100,000, which is more than enough to drown newly graduated students in debt for years to come.

However, many NCAA athletes who are advocating for paid salaries already have their tuition covered. NCAA athletes don’t need to worry about tuition, board, meals, travel fees, or medical insurance, because it’s all taken care of by their colleges. The athletes already have an advantage over their peers as well as a layer of guaranteed financial security. When people are clamoring for more benefits to college athletes, they forget that going to college for free cannot be taken for granted. Billions of dollars are given to student athletes each year for financial aid, yet people still believe the athletes get no compensation whatsoever for their contributions to the NCAA.

While the scholarship system certainly has its flaws, it is much more practical and affordable than outright paying college athletes. Paying college athletes has economic and practical shortcomings which cannot be ignored. The NCAA regulates 1,268 institutions, and it helps more than 480,000 college student-athletes compete in college sports. If the NCAA ruled that all college athletes are to be paid, many universities would instantly go bankrupt. Universities wouldn’t be able to allocate sufficient funds to pay every one of their athletes any kind of living wage, let alone the enormous contracts that they desire. Problems arise when we attempt to devise a plan for paying athletes that is both fair and possible.

The only way for some athletes to get a livable wage is if other athletes lose out on their pay. It is unreasonable to glorify some sports that are money-making machines, like basketball and football, while neglecting other sports that run apart from the mainstream—even though their players are equally talented and hard working. It isn’t fair for colleges to give separate bonuses solely based off of the type of sport the athlete plays. Every single one of the athletes are skilled in their fields, and he or she spends more or less the same amount of time and effort into practice and games. It’s true that the pay levels of the NBA and NFL are far different from the American Lacrosse League. But in the NCAA, student-athletes are not yet professionals. They are still in college; these athletes are still attending the same classes, still sleeping in the same dorm rooms, still receiving the same academics. Golf college players should not be deprived of the same benefits that more mainstream sports athletes get.

If NCAA athletes were paid, the highly competitive nature of the association would be ruined. A recent NCAA study determined that only about 20 of the over 1000 college sports programs in the nation were profitable last year. The biggest conferences raise billions of dollars a year, but the great majority of schools operate on funding from the main campus and student fees. This means that while a handful of programs can afford to pay large sums to their top athletes, the other 1,000 colleges will be caught in a hopeless bidding war that they will inevitably lose.

As a result, the NCAA would become even more polarized, with nothing stopping the richest universities from signing top talent except other rich universities. Very few colleges will be able to afford to pay five-star recruits, while the remaining colleges will have to either continue without equally talented players or find ways to raise money for their sports programs. If the colleges don’t raise money, then the NCAA will be dominated by the richest universities, and there will be a drastic drop in competitiveness. If the colleges do decide to pour money into their athletics, they will have to dig deep into their already middling funds and allocate money from their other programs toward paying their athletes. This is for any chance to compete against other schools that are richer. It’s a lose-lose scenario. Either the leagues or the universities themselves will be ruined.

The argument for paying athletes is founded on an ambition to give athletes a share of the profits that they generate. It is true that their success and popularity is what drives the NCAA. However, paying NCAA athletes isn’t the way to go. It’s an impractical and problematic alternative to the existing scholarship system, which already provides compensation for the hundreds of thousands of student-athletes in the system. If the student-athletes want to be paid, the best of the best will go on to professional leagues and make money when the time comes. But for now, college shouldn’t emulate the pros. Student comes first in student-athlete.