Professional Athletes Are Overpaid

“Touchdown Patriots! 3, 2, 1! And the Patriots win the Superbowl!” Millions of pieces of confetti were falling on them, as if it were the money that they make every year. But wouldn’t you think that people, like doctors, would earn 5.15 million dollars for saving people’s lives every single day, and professional football players would make $189,000 - $258,000? It is actually the other way around. Professional athletes started to get paid for playing sports in the 1920’s, which is when people started to actually notice them, and they were paid, on average, 5,000 dollars a year. Now don’t get me wrong, getting paid to entertain people in fine. But today, they get paid 5.15 million dollars a year, just by playing sports. I think that might be going a little bit overboard. In my opinion, professional athletes get paid too much.

There are people in our society that help shape the future for the whole country but are only paid a fraction of what athletes are paid for playing a sport. For example, there are people like teachers that might help push those athletes in the right direction towards what fame they eventually achieve, but compared to those athletes they are paid a large amount of money less than those people. Also, there are jobs out there which are considered the highest paying jobs in our society, like medicine and law, but even those high paying jobs are not paid the amount that athletes are paid (Figueroa). The president, for example, has what is considered one of the most stressful job in the country but only receives five-hundred seventy thousand dollars total yearly. That includes their yearly salary of four hundred thousand dollars, a hundred thousand dollar travel account, a fifty thousand dollar annual expense account, and about twenty thousand dollars for entertainment. In comparison to the president, the average tight end in the National Football League makes about double that amount of money in one year (Lesko). In Floyd Mayweather’s fight against Alvarez, he had earned 41.5 million dollars just for that one fight (Arciniega). In the year 1989, Rickey Henderson had signed a twelve million dollar deal that was for four years, making him get three million dollars a year. Making $3 million a year

Have you ever wondered why athletes why athletes get paid millions of dollars? Since 1995 the NBA salaries have gone up an 80 percent. The NFL salaries have jumped 18.5 percent since 1990. The average American worker makes 46,000 dollars year. Athletes should not get paid as much money because they are not actually working they are just playing sports , also laborers work longer hours and get paid less than athletes do, and finally while workers are working very hard athletes are practicing their sport.

It is arguable that pro athletes are overpaid. There are people that think pro athletes are severely overpaid, and people who think they are underpaid. Athletes get multi-million dollar contracts and multi-million dollar checks every year. There are people like doctors, police, firefighters, even EMT’s, people that save lives every day, that don’t even get half of that every year. So do the people that go out and play sports to entertain people deserve that much money?

Average people go to work everyday just like an athlete, so why do they get paid more than us? First, athletes are not the only ones that are in the sports industry. Coaches, trainers, etc., all are affected if money was to be taken out of professional sports. Lots of people would be out of a job if this were to happen. Next, athletes need money for when their careers

In today 's mainstream media the spotlight is constantly on celebrities and glorifying the life of professional athletes. The question of athletes being overpaid and not really working arises more and more. What makes their nontraditional occupation wurth a multi million dollar contract? Some say nothing-- they are grossly overpaid, but the simple truth is that the road to get to the pros entails dedication, overcoming adversity, diet, training, image and consistency. The idea that athletes are overpaid is completely false because of the preparation and work that goes into becoming elite.

As you can see professional athletes get paid too much and don’t even work as hard as others that have real jobs. If they get paid less then they won't think that they are the best and will actually try hard and be at their practice or games every time. Also, if they get paid less more people would work harder to get to the top so they get paid more. Finally, most of them didn’t even finish college, so they shouldn’t get paid millions and millions of dollars every year.

There are various athletes around the world that receives a huge amount of money. Compared to other professions, famous athletes make a lot more than doctors, engineers, scientists and many more. High class athletes make up to sixty three to four hundred million dollars a year compared to high class doctors who are saving lives everyday or soldiers who fight for their countries everyday, putting their lives on the line. Whether it is putting a ball inside a hoop or ball behind the net, athletes should not be getting payed more than other professionals. Putting your life on the line for your country or trying to save someone’s life is much more worthy of a sixty million dollar earning.

As Dick Schaap once said, “If I got paid, it was no more than five dollars a column, and I still think I was overpaid.” Have you ever been concerned that athletes are overpaid? For example, Kobe Bryant is being paid approximately $25 million dollars annually. In my opinion, I think that professional athletes are being overpaid because of these three reasons. We can use that money towards good causes, such as cancer research, and saving the people in need. Also, we can use that money towards increasing the income for teachers, because they work eight hours, and do an extra two hours of work at home. What do these athletes actually do, they just kick, throw, pass a ball and make more than ten million dollars a year.

Do we care more about entertainment than our health, and the people that run and fight for our county? Athletes make more money than hard workers, by just playing a game. Also, they often do not do much with their money for others. By all of this we can say, athletes are overpaid… by quite an amount.

We tend to play sports everyday, at every age and at basically every location. However, it is not necessary to pay athletes with an above-average wage. On top of that, athletes get millions of dollars worth of sponsors. That money could be used for someone in the more poverty-filled locations of the world Some athletes have the heart and chose to donate a huge portion of their yearly earnings; however, most don’t. Some of these athletes have huge sums of money that they don’t even know what to do with, so they choose to use it in wrong ways and that is not acceptable. Therefore, in my opinion, there are other occupations in the country that deserve a pay raise white athletes need a deduction.” Says Tulsi

Many people grow up having the dream of being rich in sports. They practice as hard as they can, and If they are just good enough then they get to play professionally. They don’t realize how much work and how much really goes on whenever they are a star athlete. The athletes in professional sports should get paid what they deserve while playing professionally.

Professional Athletes Are Not Overpaid Professional athletes are huge role models in society. Not everyone can play sports and expect to make it professionally. It takes a great deal of hard work and dedication. People overlook athletes because they do not work at an average job, at a computer, or even at an office. They play sports and get paid for it.

First and foremost, most professional athletes make millions of dollars a year for sports and I disagree with it. Sports such as football are recreational sports. To make a living more than most americans for just getting onto a field and playing is crazy. More needed or important jobs such as teachers, police officers, and fire departments make less than these athletes. One day when the work is not proportional enough to the work and I feel like these workers may get tired. The president of the United States of America makes less than most of the athletes. Raises should be made for the important jobs to be proportional to these athletes.

Wouldn’t it be great to make nearly $100 million a year simply to play a game? LeBron James, along with many other professional athletes, sure thinks so. Do these athletes really deserve all that money though? In my mind, I think absolutely not, but then I think maybe they do. Professional athletes are making too much money in a society where salaries and wages are based on the value of their work. In today’s society, I think someone should be paid according to the job’s position and value to society. Teaching is one of the most important jobs because our future will rely on the education of the children. However, teachers are paid way less than the average professional athlete is. In fact, Giancarlo Stanton, a MLB player for the Marlins, will make the average yearly salary of a teacher in 58 hours or 2.44 days. Some people may argue and say that teachers only provide service to a classroom and professional athletes are interesting fans all around the world, giving people excitement. The president, who makes huge decisions that affects the entire world every day, only makes a base salary of $400,000 a year. While President Obama is hard at work, a rookie in the MLB and others are making way over that amount of money a year. There are plenty of other jobs like doctors, police officers, and fighters, who save lives while risking their own, but for way less than professional athletes make. It’s too