CAM NEWTON IS THE STAR QUARTERBACK of the Carolina Panthers. In his last year at Auburn University, he won the Heisman trophy, led his team to a national championship, and was the highest NFL draft pick. Although that degree of success couldn’t have been predicted when Newton graduated from high school, that he had enormous talent and potential was obvious to college coaches around the country. Allegedly, his father offered to have Newton sign with Mississippi State University for a $180,000 under-thetable payment, a charge he denies. But what would be wrong with a system, some people are now asking, which permitted universities to bid for the services of players like Newton and to do so above board?82 College football is big business. With the introduction of a playoff system for the national championship, the television and other revenues that go to college football programs and to the NCAA promise to double or even triple. Right now that money subsidizes the escalating salaries of coaches and athletic directors, who at the top football schools often make millions of dollars a year—in 39 out of 50 states a college coach is the highest paid state official—as well as underwriting the construction of new and better football facilities. None of it goes to the players who make the system possible. That strikes some people as unfair. After all, for players at Division 1 schools, football is a full-time, yearround job. Shouldn’t they be compensated for doing it? Why should coaches get big salaries and players nothing?

Flush with money from television rights and maybe feeling a little guilty about sharing none of it with college athletes, the five largest football conferences—the SEC, ACC, Pac-12, Big 12, Big Ten—agree. They are pushing the NCAA to allow colleges to pay players a modest stipend, perhaps a few thousand dollars a year, and to permit college athletes to sign advertising endorsements. Various salary cap plans are also being tossed around that would limit the total amount that any college can spend on players. Critics of these ideas argue that players are already compensated. They receive tuition, room and board, and an education as well as a package of professional coaching and strength and fitness training that would, if purchased on the open market, be very expensive. In addition, they get exposure to scouts from the NFL. Critics also point to the fact that the vast majority.......

Discussion Questions 1. What would be the likely results of letting universities bid financially for college athletes? Would allowing college players to negotiate the best contract they can be good or bad for college athletics? Would such a system be fair to schools that have less money to spend on athletes?
2. Is playing Division 1 college football a job? Should it bring monetary compensation? Are college athletes exploited workers? Are they being treated unfairly by not being allowed to share directly in the revenue that college football generates?
3. Should college players have the right to unionize? Is it a matter of fairness? How would unionization affect college athletics?
4. Is the ideal of the amateur student athlete representing his or her university already obsolete, or is it worth striving to preserve?
5. If college athletics becomes completely professional, is there any reason to continue to require that athletes also be students?
6. Assuming college athletes should have a greater share of athletic revenues, what sort of compensation system would you design?