The Debate on Paying College Players- The Basics

On April 25, football players at Northwestern University will have the chance to make college athletics history.  They have the chance for a vote that would appear to move college sports forward, but might actually be a death knoll for the sport: the vote to be represented by a union.

The decision came in March, and since then, officials at Northwestern University have tried to appeal the ruling, saying that college football players are students first, and in no way are they employees of the school.  Keep in mind, this is a private school, so public universities in Illinois would not necessarily be affected by a decision.

Soon after this ruling, the house in the Ohio Legislature passed a measure saying college athletes are not employees, but in Connecticut, a measure says they have the right to unionize.  Even for someone who follows this relatively closely, the debate is a hot topic where few people have all the facts and most moves are made based on emotion.

One issue that keeps arising is how much money student athletes, mainly football and basketball players, make for their university and the NCAA.  USA Today reports in 2012, $504 million was sent to 228 Division I member schools: just over $2.2 million per school.  Of the 228, only about 10 percent of college athletic departments actually make money.  Athletic departments are funded by the money sports generate through ticket sales, merchandise and funds from the NCAA distributed to the member schools. However, even members of that 10 percent, which might be considered "self-sustaining," rely on subsidies from the school and government entities. Only seven schools on the list do not rely on a subsidy, but 76 percent of schools calculate subsidies as 50 percent or more of their revenue.  Subsidies at Cincinnati and Oregon State, two schools in the FBS "Big Six Conferences", are comprised of just over 33 and 31 percent of their revenue, respectively.

Data compiled by USA Today for 2011 shows the lowest revenue-generating school on the list, University of New Orleans, had almost $3 million in expenses.  Not including subsidies, such as student fees and government funding, the school made less than one million dollars.  Including the subsidies, they were just under $150k in the clear.  Assuming men's basketball is the money sport at the school, and this "surplus" were divided equally between 12 team sports, that's just over $12K per sport.  Seventeen basketball players could theoretically get an additional $712 each.  Basketball practices, according to NCAA regulations, can start in September.  If the team makes it to the NCAA championship, that's an additional three dollars a day for seven months.

At Texas, which does not use subsidies, athletics are just over $2.5 million in the clear.  Sixteen sports could split the extra money: $1, 564,087.81 each.  Their football roster has 98 players, and in theory each player could receive an additional $15,960.08.  At about eight months, including spring and regular season football, that's $66.50 per day.  Remember, this number is only one of 7 self-sustaining schools, and represents the most any student could get because Texas had the greatest difference in revenue minus expenses.

Under basic definitions, college athletes could be employees: they have a contract to play a sport at a university, and in turn, that university provides reasonable compensation for the student's choice to play a sport.  Simply put; said school covers student's education expenses including room and board as well as meals, student plays sport for school and complies with the rules of the NCAA.  Perhaps students need to form a labor union; representation that looks out for their interests as a whole, to include managing compensation, hours worked, working conditions, etc.

According to the NCAA website, Division I and II schools provide over $2 billion dollars in scholarships for over 126,000 student athletes, which means an average of $15, 873 per student.  Some students receive more, others receive less, because it is a coach's decision based on how much a school can provide in a certain sport.  Many student athletes receive partial funds that do not cover the full cost of college attendance.

To sum this up, paying college players is not something the sport can afford at this time.