Should College Athletes Be Paid Essay

715 Words3 Pages

Currently in college sports, athletes are legally prohibited from financially profiting for playing (Garthwaite). However, recently on July 1, 2021 there has been an exception made, which allows student athletes to receive money through non-school sponsored advertisements (Garthwaite). Many people debate whether college athletes should be paid because of the fact that colleges that compete with each other in sports have extremely different amounts of money that they have access to and how that could affect the way that college sports stay competitive. College athletes deserve to be compensated for their labor for two main reasons. One, each athlete faces a certain and often consequential physical and mental risk by participating in …show more content…

However, despite the high value of a free education, college athletes are often exempt from attending classes and held to low academic standards, both of which greatly diminish this value (Richter). The exemption from attending class and the low academic standard is a large disadvantage to each student-athlete individually because without receiving a full, authentic education the majority of college athletes who do not become professionals in their sports after college are left without the skills that they need to start a career that relies on academic knowledge (Richter). This also allows college athletes to fall deeper into debt because of the fact that college sports usually do not allow enough free time to obtain a job to pay for personal expenses …show more content…

Favoritism and unfairness is something that should be deeply considered and taken into account when making decisions to compensate athletes (Treleaven). There needs to be a scrupulous process to compensate athletes while keeping the integrity and high competitive level. Competition is very extreme in college sports because of the fact that, unlike professional leagues, there is no player trading or contracts. To many this makes college sports favorable to professional sports. The creation of a system to fairly compensate athletes while keeping the sports fair and competitive would greatly benefit the athletes by allowing them to be less affected by their lack of a thorough college education. It would also allow for better well being and it would encourage more people to play these sports because it would reduce the risk of falling into debt or failing to become a professional athlete and not receiving a good college