Just the college 231 NCAA Division in basketball makes over $9.15 billion during their financial year, and none of the income goes to the hard working athletes that make it possible. College athletes that dedicate their time, effort, sweat, and money just to get recognized for a spot on a college sport team, gets barely any recognition, no money, nor accomplishment for their relentless efforts. Over 90% of athletes don’t succeed in making the pro league where they will get recognition and money.
College athletes should be paid for putting in an effort, giving their all, training, and being part of a college league sports team. They should be paid because they worked significantly hard to be where they are today and have made major sacrifices to play in a college level team. The dedicated athletes that have made it to Division 1 college level or lower haven’t earned anything at all, while large corporate businesses earn millions of dollars and recognition. No matter the circumstances, athletes that make it to a college level team should earn money, because any popular sport, like basketball in the United States, transfers millions of dollars into the economy and business inventories, whether it's a professional or college team. Players in the NBA (league of basketball prior to college) are committed after signing a paper that guarantees the athlete millions of dollars with a date, but in college sport athletes work just as hard, sometimes harder to get a spot on the team and don’t make an income on their work.
Others say that there is a possibility that if college athletes got paid to be a part of the team, they would lose sight of the importance of playing and start being reckless and irresponsible with their income. They also might lose focus in school and academics because the think they already have it all “blind sided by money”. However, I believe there are solutions towards this statement to result in the athletes getting paid for their performance. College athletes should not be paid as much as a National League player. Instead, enough money to help them with student debt, other college expenses, and more needed (not wanted). College students playing in a Division 1 team must earn a G.P.A of at least a 2.3 to be able to continue playing on a college league team, and if an athlete is determined to go far with the success in the sport they play, money should not steer them in the wrong direction of success including working hard in academics and sports. Every athlete is stuck with a decision if they want to put in the sweat and tears to be successful or take a break at least once throughout their career. Others will say that college athletes should set their goal to go pro if they want to get paid doing their sport, and it would be too easy for students to get paid in college level sports. Surprisingly, approximately only 2% of college athletes go pro, and for thousands of college athletes working just as hard, if not more then professional athletes, they make no income and never end up getting the recognition they deserve.
College athletes should be paid to play their sports. For one, college sports a large amount of income which gives an opportunity to let athletes earn money. Without the players there would be no college sports. The athletes are being used to gain money for large industries that didn't even physically work for it. Even if athletes don’t play for money, it isn't fair and they should get some type of profit. Using baseball as an example, just the top division out 1,600 of colleges generate about 428,000 dollars of revenue per year. Some of the money from the NCAA goes to scholarships for athletes but only around 1 million dollars of it yearly. The rest goes to colleges.
(Where does the Money Go, 2) Another reason college athletes should get paid is because they work as hard as they can, and some dedicate most of their lives to play this sport at this level. An extremely high amount of these kids earn nothing out of it, if they are lucky, some will earn small scholarships, but the majority of the time, athletes put in so much effort and get little out of it. There are about 7,200,000 high school athletes, only 6% of them end up playing on a division 1 team in college. Which leads to only 492,000 kids playing in college. Then only 2% of these athletes end up going pro and making profit doing it. (NCAA, 2) Less than 100,000 of 7,200,000 athletes end up making straight profit from their work.
In conclusion, college athletes should be paid a fair amount of money for stability to play their sport instead of going to only big business corporations. Athletes should also get a better chance into getting recognized to play pro. A lot of incredible talent is right under everyone's noses.