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Are athletes paid too much?

Amber Garratt
Managing Editor

There are people starving in Africa, thousands of people living in homeless shelters across Canada, devastating environmental disasters across the world—all of which could be solved, at least in part, with money.

While all of this is happening in front of our eyes, we are simultaneously watching professional athletes get paid millions of dollars to play sports and entertain us. Is it just me, or is something seriously wrong with this picture?

According to the Sports Illustrated list of the 50 top-earning American athletes the average earning of this year’s 50 is $24.3 million. I am aware that professional athletes are talented and are the best at their respective sports, but how can they justify getting paid millions of dollars?

When I hear of athletes like LeBron James of the Miami Heat getting paid $14.5 million or Alex Rodriguez of the New York Yankees making $32 million I am appalled. It’s even worse when I hear stories of athletes holding out on signing contracts because they think they’re worth even more. How can any sane person throw a temper tantrum over getting paid millions? Drew Doughty, for example, has yet to sign a $6.8 million contract for the Los Angeles Kings. I’m sorry Drew, but there is no way you can justify throwing a hissy fit over $6.8 million.

Some may argue that getting paid millions of dollars to play is justified because of all the money they have invested into their careers. I am not saying that professional athletes should not be getting paid, but maybe a more modest amount. I would like to think athletes became professional athletes for the love of the game, not the love of money. So when did it become about the love of the money and not the game?

Athletes can put a dollar amount to their talent, but not even a thought to all those suffering without a thing to eat or a place to sleep. How can someone feel so entitled to a particular amount of money, yet not feel the need to help others?

One day I might have more respect for these athletes when they are donating even a tenth of their salary to people in need. But realistically that would never happen.

Jesse Tahirali
Editor-in-Chief

Do you know who foots the bill for every professional athlete’s bloated paycheque? You do! Congratulations!

The fact that these sports stars have salaries higher than Cheech and Chong combined isn’t indicative of greed on their part. We’re willing to dish out $120 to watch them play a sport for an hour, and that means they’re going to end up with a big bank account. It doesn’t make sense to shove money in an athlete’s face and then criticize them when it turns out they have money.

The fact is, every ball-dribbling bum who has managed to make a million bucks a year has done so with nothing more than the help of our best friend capitalism. And maybe steroids.

Interest in a sport dictates how much an athlete gets paid. Compare CFL salaries to NFL salaries to get a good idea of how this works. And then go say hello to the CFL stars when they work part-time at Home Depot.

Even if society’s excitement for sport suddenly went limp, our millions of dollars would probably just be funnelled into some other frivolous form of entertainment.

Taking one glance around any room will prove that people invest their time and money into being entertained. Televisions, computers, newspapers, magazines, books, artwork and every other self-indulgent form of amusement could be forgone for charity work. Meanwhile, yes—people elsewhere are suffering.

Disease, famine, environmental destruction—every hurdle on our track to utopia gets ignored for a chance to sit down and stare at other people doing fun things.

Blaming athletes for not transforming into philanthropists as soon as they’re tossed into the spotlight is just a way for us to feel better about our own aversion to charity. Every cent spent on mindless entertainment could be better spent on altruism, but we don’t really give much of a damn.

We would rather give all our money to the guy who has spent his whole life playing baseball, and then turn around and get upset when he doesn’t invest it wisely.

Go team humanity!

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