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Are actors and professional athletes paid too much
Are actors and professional athletes paid too much
Are actors and professional athletes paid too much
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What professions deserve to be paid top dollar? Everyone thinks of a doctor or a lawyer or a high up businessman. Nobody considers teachers, firemen, policemen, soldiers, or rescue team workers. The people who risk their lives each and every day for the safety and knowledge of our society are the people who sometimes struggle to even make a living. Is this fair? Then on the other hand you have the actors and actresses and all the professional athletes that simply wake up every morning to train and entertain the world. These people make millions and millions of dollars day in and day out, for doing nothing but entertaining.
When you compare a teacher to an actor, you obviously see that the two jobs are very different. Teachers these days have very low incomes and are sometimes put into the worst situations when it comes to the schools and students they have. I don’t think very many teachers could say that they do what they do because of the money, almost everyone would say they do it because they love the kids or just love that they feel that they are teaching and sharing knowledge with young people. I think students take their teachers for granted because even though they don’t want to admit it, without them they couldn’t get anywhere in life. Although many people look up to actors and have reasons for that, I think a teacher is more of a role model than any famous actor could be. I’m not saying that teachers should be handed loads of money but taking away ridiculous amounts of money from actors and actresses to divide into teachers’ salaries could be a very good thing.
There are good just as there are bad. While I do agree that actors and professional athletes are overpaid it’s not like their jobs are just easy. Most of their...
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...layers is absolutely ridiculous. These people don’t compare to the teachers and soldiers and all the other people who have dangerous jobs. I do think that actors and professionals are paid too much money.
Works Cited
"Do Professional Athletes, Musicians, and Actors Get Paid Too Much?" The Premier Online Debate Website. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Jan. 2014.
"Robinson Cano Salary Info and Value - Seattle Mariners Salaries -- Baseball Player Salaries." Robinson Cano Salary Info and Value - Seattle Mariners Salaries -- Baseball Player Salaries. N.p., n.d. Web. 16 Jan. 2014.
Pomerantz, Dorothy. "Robert Downey Jr. Tops Forbes' List Of Hollywood's Highest-Paid Actors." Forbes. Forbes Magazine, 16 July 2013. Web. 16 Jan. 2014.
"BASIC PAY: ACTIVE DUTY SOLDIERS." Goarmy.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 16 Jan. 2014.
"Chicago Cubs." Bleacher Report. N.p., 04 Mar. 2012. Web. 15 Jan. 2014.
When asked “Are elite sports people overpaid?” people have varied responses. Some people would agree with this and say ‘why should a person that hits or kicks a ball be paid as much as someone who saves lives or teaches children everyday? But on the other hand some would disagree and say that sports people are paid for their skills just like everybody else! These are both very good arguments.
Cooper, Kenneth J. "Should College Athletes be Paid to Play?" Diverse Issues in Higher Education 28.10 (2011): 12-3. ProQuest. Web. 24 Nov. 2013.
There are twenty-five players who make more than ten million dollars per year, a price that, ten years ago, only two players made half of that (azcentral.com). The Seattle Mariners had the highest median salary in 2002 at over 3.3 million dollars per player. Ten years ago, the same Seattle Mariners had a median salary of $317,500; an increase of over three million dollars or an increase of over 900% (usatoday.com). This trend can be seen in all Major League franchises. The salaries in Major League Baseball are growing at an astronomical rate that should not only decrease, but halt, due to the fact that these salaries are pushing away the fans that support these businesses and the lack of parity within baseball itself.
They only make a little more than average household income. The CEOs, athletes, celebrities that do make millions of dollars are those who worked for it and therefore it is completely justifiable. People need to quit blaming others for their downfall instead of arguing about the pay gap between CEO and workers they should strive to become a CEO. Anything is possible, and everything is reachable with the correct
Cooper, Kenneth J. "Should College Athletes Be Paid to Play?." Diverse: Issues In Higher Education 28.10 (2011): 12-13.Academic Search Complete. Web. 22 Apr. 2014.
Cooper, Kenneth J. "Should College Athletes Be Paid To Play?." Diverse: Issues In Higher Education 28.10 (2011): 12-13. OmniFile Full Text Select (H.W. Wilson). Web. 6 Feb. 2014.
In thirteen years of golf, Tiger Woods has made over a billion dollars making him the highest paid athlete ever. He has been the highest paid athlete now for five years in a row. We all know that many people in the world watch him play every weekend and admire him, but is the amount of entertainment he provides really worth 128 million dollars a year? Tiger is only one of many professional athletes who are extremely overpaid. “People forget that sports is entertainment,” says Leonard Armato, a sports agent. Although professional athletes provide entertainment for millions of viewers around the world, they are overpaid because the millions of dollars that they make could be distributed more evenly throughout society and go to things of a greater cause.
Works Cited Edelman,Marc “21 Reasons Why Student Athletes Are Employees and Should be Allowed to Unionize” Forbes Magazine. (2014) Hartnett, Tyson “College Athletes Should Be Paid” Huffington Post. (2013) No Author “Pro Athletes Way Overpaid” Daily Herald. (2013) Rovell, Darren “NCAA President No Pay For Players On Jersey Sales” CNBC.
According to Times Magazine, “Upmarket estate agents have been voted the most overpaid members of any profession, ahead of lawyers, celebrity chefs and football players.” (Coates), however many people believe that professional athletes have the most overpaid occupation. An average athlete’s salary ranges depending on the sport you participate in. In the NBA an athlete makes around five million dollars a year; yet in the MLB an average baseball player will make about three million dollars a year. A football player In the NFL averages two million dollars a year, and the NHL’s average salary is roughly $1.5 million dollars (Coates). Athletes are not the problem in today’s economy; the problem is currently America’s physicians. The focus should be put more specifically on physicians and not professional athletes because we need physicians to survive; while athletes are a source of entertainment. Although an athlete’s salary is surprising large, athletes willing do what they love because of their fan base and all of the people that support them throughout their career. Physicians lost the focus that was once on their patients, and are now concentrating more on how they can supplement their money, which is selfishly putting them above all people. Having a doctor who is unfocused is threatening to all patients, who may or may not know what it actually going in behind closed doors.
These are just some of the reasons why athletes are paid so much money. The controversy of athletes being overpaid dates back to 1922, when well-known baseball player George “Babe” Ruth received $50,000 within the first year of his career. Ruth’s extensive wealth was bolstered by dozens of endorsements (Saperecom). As it is shown in figure 1, in the Fortunate 50 Tiger Woods takes the number one spot for highest paid athlete.
Pomerantz, D. (2013, July 16). Robert Downey Jr. Tops Forbes' List Of Hollywood's Highest-Paid Actors. Retrieved from Forbes: http://www.forbes.com
Can you imagine if a popular movie was never made, say the Hunger Games? What if Jennifer Lawrence quit her job on the 1st half of the mockingjay, and the second half was in shambles to find someone who would work, their movie could be ruined! This is the hard and gruelling life of an actor. Day-in, day-out you're working on your movie, and something could go very terribly wrong. This debate is based on the fact that actors don’t get payed to much, because of the time and effort they put into their job.
When addressing the value of entertainment, there is without a doubt, that we as a society value entertainment highly. But there is no reason that these athletes, who are here to merely entertain us, get paid higher wages than those that save our lives and teach us such as medical doctors and teachers. I find it ridiculous that players make millions of dollars a year, and yet demand more. The entertainment that these athletes provide is solely entertainment; it is not essential to the function or productivity of society. If I were to become a professional football player I would not complain about my salary for many reasons. I am playing the sport that I love and getting paid for it. The minimum wage for football is well over $100,000 a year, as is for many professional sports. These reasons by their lonesome are enough to warrant that the salary professional athletes are paid is suffice.
One issue that these high salaries cause is that having all this money spoils the athletes. Athletes buy so much unnecessary stuff after they get their money. For example, Michael Jordan has about 28 cars. Who needs all these cars? He didn’t buy all of these, but there is a certain limit on how many cars a person needs. Athletes spend their money on cars, entertainment, clothes, and their big mansions. Another instance of athletes spoiling themselves is the use of illegal drugs (“Pro Salaries”). Michael Irvin of the Dallas Cowboys has been involved in many of these altercations. He has been through all the punishments there possibly is and still makes his money (“Pro Salaries”). Athletes think they are at a higher level and that they can do whatever they want. An issue that everyone hears about everyday that a pro athlete has committed a murder/crime. Ray Lewis, a safety for the Baltimore Ravens, is being tried for two accounts of murder. He is an excellent athlete. He is on the pro-bowl team for the 1999 season and led the league in tackles. He has just ruined his career by even being involved in a situation like this. Another player is Robert Lewis, a 20 year-old basketball player from the Dallas Mavericks. He was convicted of beating his girlfriend almost to death. A 20-year-old basketball star doesn’t need to feel that he is a king to be a leader. What kind of role model is he setting to other youngsters that want to follow in the same footsteps?
Finally, I feel that movie stars and major league athletes are always getting the bad end of the stick when it comes to how much money they make, despite the fact that people of importance, like doctors and even the president of the United States, don’t make as much as the stars do. Now everyone in life has a choice to be what they want to be in life, many people should research the criteria and salaries before they get mad that a certain person is making more money than another. And don’t forget that its society that is really funding them as an entertainer and actors have taken years to get where they are today. And even though stars are portrayed as greedy, they are often known for their philanthropic sprit.