Should College Athletes Be Paid Essay

Whether or not college athletes should be paid is not an easy question to answer as both sides of the argument have very valid claims. Most college students, especially those of whom are athletes, have extremely busy lives. It is also important to understand that athletes' main focus is sports, not academics. Athletes are not going to college to learn and earn a professional degree, but they are instead going there to pursue their goals in sports. College athletes should be paid after carefully considering financial and moral decisions such as the amount each athlete should get paid, how the athletes’ education will be affected, and what paying these people would mean for their futures.

When thinking only on the surface level of the issue,

People have to understand that a better word to refer to these people than “student athletes” is “athlete students” because their first priority is obviously sports, as stated by Joe Nocera on page 23 of the Junior Scholastic company’s article on whether or not college athletes should be paid. Colleges even go to the extent of forcing these students to pick classes that do not interfere with their sport. College sports make billions of dollars and pay nothing to the main workforce. These both are also facts mentioned by Nocera. It also seems very unfair that everyone in the industry, from janitors to coaches, get paid, but the college athletes themselves do not get paid. These players have to spend 50 or more hours a week on their sport with little to no time for other things according to Nocera. All in all, college athletes are basically working a full time job that entertains so many people and benefits so many others besides themselves. Having

Most colleges force their athletes to take classes that do not interfere with their sport, which makes their college experience not about education at all. Also, only about 2 percent of college athletes actually go on to become professional athletes, says Bob Willaims, Senior Vice President of Communication for the NCAA on page 23 of Junior Scholastic’s article about paying college athletes. This makes it so that if a college athlete is not able to become a professional athlete for any reason, their future is basically doomed. This can cause the lives of the player, and his or her family financially and mentally. However, if these college athletes got paid, at least they would have some funds to work off of to support themselves. Thus, not paying college athletes and forcing them to be focused on only their sport affects not only a person’s education, but also their entire future. Paying college athletes would specifically affect player attitudes towards the sport. Money can psychologically change how human beings think and perceive things. Paying college athletes will therefore completely change their thoughts and ideas about their sport. College athletes may end up trying harder on the sport. This will most probably make the sport more interesting for people to watch. The sports will also become more competitive and selective if players are being paid.