The Economic Feasibility of Paying College Athletes

Abstract

The purpose of this thesis is to look at the financial ability of Division 1 athletic programs to pay their college athletes an annual salary. It has long been debated whether or not college athletes should be paid for the revenues that they bring in for their schools from ticket and apparel sales, but most of this debate comes in the form of subjective and opinion based articles and sources. This paper will take that highly ethical question and look at it through an objective financial lens in order to determine if athletes could receive salaries based off of the profits of their respective institutions, similar to that of a business. One of my findings is that most Division 1 programs are not sufficiently profitable, as only 6 of the 106 teams from the sample observed would be able to pay their athletes an annual salary of $25,000 a year.