Pro Athletes Are Overpaid Essay

512 Words3 Pages

Soldiers who fight in wars to protect our nation get paid less than the people we watch for a few hours on TV. Professional Athletes are overpaid because other important jobs make significantly less than these entertainers and they don’t even play games year round. The first reason as to why professional athletes are overpaid is due to the fact that other much more important jobs don’t have anywhere near the pay of an athlete. The wage gap between a lawyer or a doctor and a professional athlete is shocking. The highest paid doctors make around 500,000 a year, while the highest paid Cubs players in 2012 made 19 million dollars. The difference in pay is even bigger when you compare an athlete’s pay to a lawyer’s, which is only 170,000 dollars with eleven years of experience. Due to this huge difference in pay, some people may be discouraged from doing these important jobs because they could make so much more if they become an athlete. The second reason why professional athletes are overpaid is because of how little they play in a year. Athletes play seasons, which means that …show more content…

Athletes make millions of dollars a year, and even if their annual salary goes down a bit, they could still take care of themselves and pay the bills. The other argument, that they inspire children to work hard, makes it sound as if all other people who don’t play sports can’t motivate kids. Many of my colleagues are inspired by other people, such as friends, musicians, and family members. I am personally inspired by musicians such as Trombone Shorty and Wynton Marsalis. Using that logic, Mr. Marsalis and Trombone Shorty should be making 40,000,000 dollars a year, which is not what they’re being paid at the moment. Inspiration should not be a reason to pay athletes millions and lowering their pay would not be the end of the world for