Staggering Amount Of Money On NFL Stadiums By Travis Waldron

The article “Taxpayers Have Spent A 'Staggering' Amount of Money On NFL Stadiums” by Travis Waldron draws attention to two main points. First that American Taxpayers spent an estimated seven billion dollars to help construct twenty- nine of the thirty- one NFL stadiums in our country. This placed the risk of bankruptcy on the taxpayers rather than on the league whose annual revenue is more than ten billion dollars. Second, cities in America love their football teams and will spend very large amounts of money to keep their hometown franchises in place. The author finishes the article by saying, “That $7 billion figure will only continue to grow long after the NFL season begins Thursday night” (Waldron). This quote leads me to think that American cities spend too much money and place too much social emotional emphasis on NFL franchises. American cities have disbursed great sums of money to build and renovate NFL stadiums. For example, of the sixteen home games being played this week across the country, taxpayers spent a combined 3 billion dollars to help build the stadium of the team hosting the game (Waldron). The author states that this amount is unacceptable because many of

Across the country, cities invested millions of dollars into sports delveoplment strategies to keep or lure pro teams to their city (Waldron). For example, the city of Cincinnati spent 424 million dollars on the Cincinnati Bengals but later “had to sell a public hospital to clo se budget holes” (Waldron). The financial numbers are stagering. Some of these cities previously expended money on the sports entertainment market but mysteriously ran out when it came time to balance the budget or to make vital improvements in the city. Cities will continue to spend large amounts of funds on NFL teams because the allure of the franchise and the notority they bring with them is to great to say no