Why do Footballers get Paid Too Much?
Overpaid, overpampered, overappreciated. These licentious miscreants spend their lives playing a game, a game no less, that we all love, every day — which is surely reward enough — though on top of their fun they receive immense wages while others slave away at jobs they likely despise for a fraction of the price. They don’t deserve it surely? All they do is kick a ball, you and I could do that? It’s so unjust. So inequitable. So infuriating.
Footballers’ wages are the subject of great animosity and conversation with countless newspaper columns and social media posts violently targeting their inequality. In fact the mere notion is such a poisoned chalice that the slightest mention can throw even the most hardened Capitalists into a ravenous Marxist rage, but to put aside some of this anger just for a moment, to sheath your readied swords, holster your proverbial pistols and put away your worshiped copy of Das Kapital, its spine crumbling from its countless readings, its pages stuck together from the tears of realisation, the sweat of body shaking revelation, this article will look to question some of the main criticisms levelled at this deeply entrenched view and present a different perspective to the wage structure of footballers, and perhaps professional athletes more widely.
First off, I would like to make the point that in my opinion, football has the perhaps the fairest structural hierarchy for its players in the world. It is a complete and global meritocracy, unlike anything else. Let’s take for contrast a high earning job like say a doctor. In order to become a doctor, you need an education and a good one at that. In the UK to gain a place at a university to train to become a doctor you need to gain very high grades. A typical offer for such a degree is AAA or even A*AA, the cream of the crop. Education in this country alone is anything but equal to all. Though figures from 2016/2017 show that 90% of students at university received a state education but at the most prestigious universities, and thus the most employable, these figures are much lower. Chairman of the Sutton Trust, an educational charity focused on social mobility, Sir Peter Lampl suggested that in their investigations this is indeed the case.
“It also remains the case that those from better off neighbourhoods are much more likely to go to university — especially to selective Russell Group universities.”
Their latest investigation published in 2018 also suggests that those from disadvantaged backgrounds are 12% less likely to think they will enter higher education compared to those from more advantaged backgrounds. There principle reasons for this tends to be the cost of the education itself and the repayment of the debt owed. If such an inevitable bias exists in the UK then so too must it exist in even more formidable levels in countries with greater levels of inequality. And education is just one such example, let alone the natural and malignant biases ever present that bubble under the surface.In order to achieve in these fields, it matters greatly what band of economic society you are born into as well as where you were born. In other words, they are systematically unjust. Your likelihood of success is far more down to the circumstances of your existence rather than your individual merit. This is simply not so in Football.
Footballers come from all different backgrounds from all over the world. Some from big cities with huge football followings, some from remote regions of the globe where football, as with people, is sparing. Some have high level education, some the bare minimum. All there success however is based on their individual talent alone. If you are good, you will be signed, if you are better than your colleagues at one level, you will be found and rise, again and again till you reach your level. Football is so universal, played in nearly every corner, back alley and crevasse the world over, that where there are people there is football. Where there are children, there are Messi shirts. And where there are people and children playing football there are people watching. In like a good way though, not that way. The biggest clubs in the world constantly scan every continent for talent and prospects. And whilst not all continents are equally watched, if there is a league there is a network of people willing to offer you the opportunity of progress. It doesn’t matter where you are from, what you look like, your previous history, whether you are friendly or not, pleasant or not, the colour of your skin or the content of your character; if you are good enough you will progress and if you progress you earn more. At the highest levels of football are thus individuals from all over the world with all different backgrounds all succeeding, progressing and earning for no other reason than they are the best. What could possibly be fairer than that?

Down to the more direct issue of wages themselves. Whether or not you may think the evaluation is fair or not, players earn what they are worth, which in this definition is devoid of any wider moral factors and simply means the maximum they can possibly charge for their services. Football, especially at the higher forms of the game, is very good at constant adjustments in order to make this the case. Contracts typically for a professional are from 3 to 5 years. Thus, despite the short length of their careers, there is ample scope for adjustment. If a player feels he is undervalued he can ask for an increased contract reflecting his relative worth to the team. If there is a disparity between their evaluation and that of their clubs, with but a short contract they need only wait a short while before they can force a move to a club that has a similar evaluation of their worth. Players often have very strong negotiating positions and are thus able to achieve their maximum earnings, i.e. their worth. This does also work the other way. If you have been over evaluated and are no longer considered worth the amount you are receiving you will be sold to a different club who will meet this lesser evaluation. In this way Football can be brutal. Many of the great players who have been loyal servants to a club for a long time see little of that loyalty returned when their performance levels wains in the twilights of their careers. However, this was no one way street. Players play for these clubs mostly, or at the very least partially, because they offer the most chance of fame, success and high wages. You cannot shake hands with the cynical Butler at the front door but then curse him as he throws you out the back.
As to whether or not the actual number associated to their value is the sticking point is a difficult point to argue, and unfortunately harsh on the ear. We live in a society where the vast majority of people work for others and value is exactly in relation of how much money you make for your company, how hard your job is and perhaps most importantly of all, how many other people are able to do your job as you do. Football clubs make a lot of money, huge amounts in fact, largely due to the immense reach and following it has globally and thus the huge opportunities for advertising and franchising. It therefore follows logically that the best teams have the widest reach as they play the best football and are present in the most televised leagues and competitions. Therefore, to make the most money it is key to be at least one of the best. How do you become the best? By getting the best players. How do you get the best players? Well you buy their services by offering more than everyone else. The more money you are willing to offer, the greater the player you are going to entice. With these vast swathes of money, clubs can invest in making their teams the best and therefore make more money. As there are many rich clubs in the world, the competition for these players is fierce and greater competition means greater investment. It’s ugly, unromantic and factual.
There is no doubt of the perfectly legitimate rebuke that say fireman or policeman should earn more because they do more for society at large, a comparison so commonly conjured to demonstrate the contrast between wage inequality and social worth. A firefighter to a footballer, it is easy, and perhaps even correct, to conjure an emotional frustration at the injustice. But the world simply isn’t like that. Besides the fact that the attributes of the average premier league footballer are far rarer than those of the average fireman, it is also a sad fact to say no moral standard exists for worth. It is an unfortunate fact that our world is based on money, not morals. You need only look at the unapologetic and apoplectic look on every bankers’ face and their shrugs as the entire financial world collapsed around them. This is however not the fault of a footballer and they should not be the target of this frustration. They are a product of this system, just as you are.
It does seem surprising that footballers are the target of such resentment where other high earners, both inside and outside of sport, aren’t subject to quite the same testing irritation. On the scale of sports riches footballers are on the upper level but are by no means the top. Top golfers, top boxers, top tennis players, top formula 1 drivers often earn far more than their footballing counterparts. In the Forbes top 50 sporting earners, only 4 are footballers which is equal to the number of golfers and less compared to the 18 basketball players, and the 9 American Footballers that make up the list. Outside of sport, actors and actresses also earn fortunes for relatively minor, relatively socially unhelpful work as well as musicians and neither of these industries can ever possibly claim to be anywhere near as merit driven as professional sport. So why is so much anger aimed at footballers? After all these should be the rags to riches stories that everyone ought to love. In football there are countless numbers of accounts of now very successful players who came from relative poverty and through their own skill and hard work achieved great success. Take for example this interview given by Romelu Lukaku to the BBC for their world cup coverage this summer.
“I came home from school and I saw my mum adding water to the milk and it was the same bowl as the day before. She put it in the microwave and told me to come eat. I didn’t say anything, I just ate but I understood that we were broke, I understood really quickly. … No electricity, no heating. My mum used to warm water with like a gas thing, from like a heater. She would light the gas heater then put the hot water on top. Then I would take a shower with like a cup and I’d splash it on top of my head. … My dad was playing lower division football so like my dad when he has to train, like I used to come back from training, give my football shoes to my dad and he could go now. Me and my dad used to share the same shoes. I told my mum I am going to play for Anderlecht later and you’ll see, everything is going to change. And when I retire everything will be good, trust me.”

These are the sort of stories that ought to inspire, ought to endear the masses and no doubt for many they do. But for many still the size of their wages cause a wanton dislike and sets unreasonable standards for an ordinary person. It is commonplace that whenever any negativity or anguish is expressed by a footballer, no matter how serious or sincere, is met with dismissal due to their worth. How can they be upset they lost with the money they make? How is it possible for anyone to be depressed with their wages? Why with that much money could you possibly be insecure or give a damn about the hate you receive? It is as if because they earn what they do they are inhuman and not subject to the same emotions, the same feelings as the rest of us. Or at least not entitled to be. Such a position is at best hopelessly misinformed and at worst malicious.
There are of course problems with football that are irrevocably interlinked with money. I am not suggesting there aren’t. Issues of ticket prices, of corruption, of the separation between the club as a company and the club as representation of a community are all prominent issues and ones not easily reconciled. These issues of franchisement and expanse however are wholly separate from that of wages. There are far too many variables to link so haphazardly the statements ‘football tickets cost too much money’ and ‘footballers get paid too much’, and it is all too easy to misdirect and misconstrue real and genuine grievances towards the mistakenly perceived benefactors of the change, rather than the true culprits. The issues may cause similar indignation, but their realities are separate.
