66 replies to this topic

[BigCHrome]

Lewis Hamilton 15th highest paid athlete in the world - not too bad.

http://www.forbes.co...s_slide_16.html

[Grenada]

15th highest paid athlete in the world - not too bad.

http://www.forbes.co...s_slide_16.html

They have his age wrong though - how does that happen in the internet age?

[SCUDmissile]

Alonso 11th Highlest paid Athlete in the World; 2nd Highlest F1 driver.

1.Tiger Woods (USA/Golf)-51.8 million euros
2.Kobe Bryant ((USA/NBA) - 36.6 million EUR)
3.LeBron James (USA/NBA)-33,15 EUR million
4.Roger Federer (SUI/tennis)-32.5 million EUR
5.Phil Mickelson (USA/Golf)-32.1 million EUR
6.David Beckham (GBR/football)-27.6 million EUR
7.Cristiano Ronaldo (by / football) - 26.2 million EUR
8.Alex Rodríguez (USA/Baseball)-24.1 million EUR
9.Michael Schumacher (ALE /F1) - 23.5 million EUR
10.Lionel Messi (ARG/football)-22.3 million euros
11.Fernando Alonso (ESP/F1)-22.1 million euros

from forbes nowhttp://www.forbes.co...es_slide_3.html

Edited by SCUDmissile, 03 June 2011 - 11:10.

[as65p]

Alonso 11th Highlest paid Athlete in the World; 2nd Highlest F1 driver.

Schumacher earns the most Wasnt' aware of that. Weird... but kudos to the old man at the same time, nobody else could make so much out of so little, I reckon.

[SCUDmissile]

most of it would be sponsorship from that Deucthe Vermsmwofjsofsjg.

cant spell it. interesting, that Tiger woods earns the most still, and that Lewis isnt on that list. Maybe McLaren dont pay him well.

[RenArto]

most of it would be sponsorship from that Deucthe Vermsmwofjsofsjg.

cant spell it. interesting, that Tiger woods earns the most still, and that Lewis isnt on that list. Maybe McLaren dont pay him well.

Lewis is 15th

[SCUDmissile]

Lewis is 15th

Facepalm for me.

Lewis gets a lot of his money from Sponsorship from ReeBok and Vodafone, but i havent seen Alonso with much sponsorship apart from Santander.

[merschu]

F1 - Forbes says Schumacher highest-earning driver

Jun.3 (GMM) He may not have reprised his earlier successes since returning, but Michael Schumacher is still the highest-earning driver in formula one.That is the finding of business magazine Forbes, according to its latest annual ranking of the world's 50 highest paid athletes.

German Schumacher, 42, appears at number 9 on the list with a reported US $34 million in earnings.The number takes into consideration not only his Mercedes retainer but, according to Forbes, an athletes'"bonuses, prize money, appearance fees, licensing and endorsement income".Schumacher is therefore two places higher than Ferrari's Fernando Alonso, with $32 million.Lewis Hamilton ranks 15th with his $30 million, two places behind MotoGP's Valentino Rossi, with $31m.


NASCAR drivers Dale Earnhardt Jr, Jeff Gordon and Jimmie Johnson also appear in the top 50, with Earnhardt ranked highest of the trio with his 17th.Forbes said the world's highest earning athlete is Tiger Woods ($75m), with the average earnings of the top 50 being $28m -- 11 per cent down on 2010.

http://f1.madeinmoto...iver-23518.html

[e34]

Schumacher earns the most Wasnt' aware of that. Weird... but kudos to the old man at the same time, nobody else could make so much out of so little, I reckon.

<--- David Beckham sends you his warmest greetings, from the sixth place

[kosmos]

Uh, no Nadal?, and why it's Beckham there?.

[broooz]

Is there anyone else who thinks that such earnings are shameful and disgusting?

Edited by broooz, 03 June 2011 - 12:20.

[Watkins74]

Is there anyone else who thinks that such earnings are shameful and disgusting?

I don't.

[krapmeister]

I don't know what Schumacher is on about - 'the big joy isn't there'.

23.5million?!! Christ, how big does his joy have to be?

[smitten]

Is there anyone else who thinks that such earnings are shameful and disgusting?

If I had the talent and dedication to earn that much I wouldn't have any qualms about it. You get paid what people think you are worth; it doesn't matter if you think X isn't worth that much, it only matters that the guys writing the cheques do.

PS - they are all educated guesses, not facts.

[learningtobelost]

Is there anyone else who thinks that such earnings are shameful and disgusting?

Why?

People are paid what the market value dictates they are worth, based on the rarity of their skill set, attitude, work-ethic, personality etc. The fact that say a top flight footballer is paid 1000x what a soldier earns has nothing to do with the worthiness of the career or the dangers faced but to do with the rarity of the individual that is neccecary to do that type of work at that level.

Sport stars are paid as much as they are because they are effective promotional tools, high profile billboards. As long as you have advertising in Sport you will have very highly paid sport stars. You can argue the morality of this as much as you like, but the truth of the matter is that without advertising F1, Football, etc would be tiny, maybe even untelevised so it is a neccecary evil.

[GreyArrow]

Is there anyone else who thinks that such earnings are shameful and disgusting?

No.

I have always found the (in the UK anyway) lazy old line about it being disgusting that footballers earn millions and nurses earn considerably less rather flawed.

The bottom line is: The sportsmen/women are the workers.

These sports generate vast amounts of revenue because millions of people choose to view them. If the workers don't get the money, who does? The organisers, the directors, the guys in grey suits etc. Sure, in F1 Bernie has made his billions, but I think it is quite OK that some of that income makes it to the drivers, and as a proportion of F1's income, the amount paid to the drivers seems fair.

If you can convince millions of people to tune in to watch you polish your lathe/be an accountant/teach/bake or whatever it is you do, then you too deserve to get paid millions.

What would be disgusting is if these guys attract all this revenue, but don't get their fair share of it.

Edited by GreyArrow, 03 June 2011 - 12:40.

[as65p]

<--- David Beckham sends you his warmest greetings, from the sixth place

Have to trust you on that, I stopped caring for football some 20 years ago.

Really I was only talking about the F1 guys. Not nearly into it enough with any other kind of sport.

[as65p]

Facepalm for me.

Lewis gets a lot of his money from Sponsorship from ReeBok and Vodafone, but i havent seen Alonso with much sponsorship apart from Santander.

Then again, Alonso with his Santander money rules the whole circus. Or so I heard....

[robefc]

No.

I have always found the (in the UK anyway) lazy old line about it being disgusting that footballers earn millions and nurses earn considerably less rather flawed.

The bottom line is: The sportsmen/women are the workers.

These sports generate vast amounts of revenue because millions of people choose to view them. If the workers don't get the money, who does? The organisers, the directors, the guys in grey suits etc. Sure, in F1 Bernie has made his billions, but I think it is quite OK that some of that income makes it to the drivers, and as a proportion of F1's income, the amount paid to the drivers seems fair.

If you can convince millions of people to tune in to watch you polish your lathe/be an accountant/teach/bake or whatever it is you do, then you too deserve to get paid millions.

What would be disgusting is if these guys attract all this revenue, but don't get their fair share of it.

Revenue but not profits, if you take football for instance (at least the clubs).

I had a coaching session with one of the top freeride skiers in England the other day and he was talking about this. He said he used to be a barman in southampton and he was serving beers to the Southampton footballers who weren’t nearly good enough to get in the England team, he was the number one in England for his chosen sport and yet he was the one serving them.

I sympathised but discussed the economic argument as you have, he pointed out that players wages have put clubs to the wall and that most of them are run at a loss on borrowed money…which was an interesting point.

He also said more needed to be done to publicise extreme sports, he couldn’t understand how a football match could be more interesting than watching people doing amazing things that virtually no-one can do and literally putting their lives on the line.

Must be annoying to be awesome at something and to put a huge amount of effort in but, due to an accident of fate, it just happens to be at something which no-one cares about so there’s no money in it.

[robefc]

Is there anyone else who thinks that such earnings are shameful and disgusting?

Well if you mean the fact that we live in a world where people can earn those sorts of figures whilst other people die for lack of basic necessities like clean water then yes it is shameful.

But from that perspective all of our earnings are shameful as well; the difference between me and Lewis Hamilton is far less significant than the difference between me and the poorest people on the planet…probably less significant than the difference between me and half the people on the planet.

[OfficeLinebacker]

Is there anyone else who thinks that such earnings are shameful and disgusting?

When it's someone else making that much, it's shameful and disgusting.

If it were me, or close friends/family, the tune would be different.

For me, it's a waste of energy to try to judge a situation that already exists. The participants have willingly entered into the agreement that results in this situation, who am I to then say this is "good" or "bad?" (or "shameful" or "disgusting"). If I have a problem with it, the problem is inside of me.

[Dunder]

Is there anyone else who thinks that such earnings are shameful and disgusting?

No.

[oetzi]

There's also the fact that very few people who try at these careers make it. Virtually everyone who wants to be a nurse or a fireman can make it, very few who want to be a sportsman do.

Re the extreme sports thing, they're a much bigger deal in places like Switzerland, Austria, etc where most people try these things up to a certain level, just as in the UK most people try football up to a certain level but not extreme sports, and guess what's popular here.

[King Six]

Most of this comes from sponsorships/doing adverts/promotion and such. The likes of Woods and Beckham who have been past it for ages still rake it in because they love marketing themselves, they're egomaniacs.

[Archybald]

Is there anyone else who thinks that such earnings are shameful and disgusting?

Im curious as to how it can be ...

If someone takes your face and puts it on a mousemat ... and then decide to sell that mousemat ... you'd deserve part of the money being made from that right?

Would it be your fault if millions of people bought that mousemat and you netted a tidy sum?

or do you think there should be some sort of cap say when you reach a certain point you no longer can earn any money from said mousemat?
if there was that cap then the manufacturers would keep earning or would they have to stop earning money from said mouse mat at that point?
If the mouse mat manufacturers make stops earning them any more money theres no reason to make that product.

Drivers are similar to that Schumy being in Mercedes attracts more people to invest money into the mercedes team ... thus Schumachers presence in a team would become a comodity if the public are willing to buy alot of things just because of schumacher he should clearly get money for it shouldnt he?


Earning vast sums of money doesnt cause morality problems. Exploiting people in order to earn vast amounts of money does.

[Peter3hg]

Most of this comes from sponsorships/doing adverts/promotion and such. The likes of Woods and Beckham who have been past it for ages still rake it in because they love marketing themselves, they're egomaniacs.

Or they just like making money, which is the far more logical reason.

[oetzi]

Or they just like making money, which is the far more logical reason.

It's not really up to them when they stop. If the offers aren't there, they can't make money.

[arknor]

I don't know what Schumacher is on about - 'the big joy isn't there'.

23.5million?!! Christ, how big does his joy have to be?

he was on around 80million $ a year at his peak , him and tiger woods are the only two sportsmen to break a billion $ last i checked

btw he just bought a new jet for 30million $ and it has the mercedes silver paintscheme someone posted pics of it in the schumacher thread

Edited by arknor, 03 June 2011 - 15:18.

[Jimisgod]

Schumacher highest paid F1 driver in 2010? does this disprove any link between performance and wage in the capitalist system? I guess those were some long term personal contracts he signed.

[Smile17]

I was also very surprised to see Schumacher so high up there. It's of course all because of his sponsors who want to pay big money for his image. Also a very big gap between Bryant and Gasol, expected, but this is way too much. When I spoke about it with my friend who knows a lot more about this kind of lists, he told me it includes a lot of guessing. Oh and another thing to take into consideration, Alonso's sponsor earnings are not known, it's not very clear.

[faaaz]

Is there anyone else who thinks that such earnings are shameful and disgusting?

ARE you kidding? What is your premise of that conclusion? Especially F1 drivers, they literally risk their life week and week out, they deserve all the $. Though I think Massa is probably lucky with those figures.

[Smile17]

Is there anyone else who thinks that such earnings are shameful and disgusting?

Yes when we are talking about Tiger Woods and some NBA stars yes. I completely agree with you.

[faaaz]

Sponsors etc decide upon how much they pay a sports star depending on the amount of brand exposure they provide for the company. Tiger Woods has been the best golfer in the world for a long time, he is iconic and a household name even to those who don't understand crap about golf. The exposure he has given the sponsoring brands would be priceless, and the money tiger Woods receive is probably a fraction of what his talents have contributed to the brand. Same goes for basketball players, football players.

People should worry more about how much their government spends on defence/war. That is more worrying than any salary sport stars receive.

[stillOrange]

Is there anyone else who thinks that such earnings are shameful and disgusting?

Maybe not shameful and disgusting but definitely wrong and in some ways disrespectful.

That is simply because of the sector I work in. Charitable.

Luckily though many of these athletes are generous and share big bulks of these "unspendable" salaries with others.

[J. Edlund]

No.

I have always found the (in the UK anyway) lazy old line about it being disgusting that footballers earn millions and nurses earn considerably less rather flawed.

The bottom line is: The sportsmen/women are the workers.

These sports generate vast amounts of revenue because millions of people choose to view them. If the workers don't get the money, who does? The organisers, the directors, the guys in grey suits etc. Sure, in F1 Bernie has made his billions, but I think it is quite OK that some of that income makes it to the drivers, and as a proportion of F1's income, the amount paid to the drivers seems fair.

If you can convince millions of people to tune in to watch you polish your lathe/be an accountant/teach/bake or whatever it is you do, then you too deserve to get paid millions.

What would be disgusting is if these guys attract all this revenue, but don't get their fair share of it.

Most professional sports clubs these days are driven as companies, that goes for F1 teams too. The purpose of any company is to return a profit to its shareholders who have chosen to invest their money in the company, not to pay workers what they "deserve".

In many sports we have seen wages increasing beyond control, leading to a an economic bubble. The companies pay more for their athletes than they can really afford in order to be competitive and in the end they are only making losses simply because their employees, the athletes are overpaid. Sports is hardly the only sector were we can see this development. In the banking sector for instance companies are paying more and more in order to get the best CEO, chairman or whatever, in the end risking the whole company simply because they all think they will be more competetive if they can pay more.

In some sports, such as in the National Hockey League, they have introduced a cost cap. A team is allowed to spend more than a certain sum in saleries for the players. This in turn ensure that the league is economically sound.

ARE you kidding? What is your premise of that conclusion? Especially F1 drivers, they literally risk their life week and week out, they deserve all the $. Though I think Massa is probably lucky with those figures.

Given that there hasn't been a death in F1 for quite some time I would say that the risks are quite small these days. There are also other jobs where the employee is put at a higher risk than others. Jobs that involve working at altitude (such as a construction worker) or truck drivers tend to be high on the list of jobs with a high risk.

[faaaz]

Given that there hasn't been a death in F1 for quite some time I would say that the risks are quite small these days. There are also other jobs where the employee is put at a higher risk than others. Jobs that involve working at altitude (such as a construction worker) or truck drivers tend to be high on the list of jobs with a high risk.

I wont even consider that first sentence as a serious comment, it is ridiculous beyond reason. And I don't think there is a bubble in sports, it is simply risk and reward. If one sporting club goes down because they invested too highly in a player then thats the way it goes. Bubble is on an industry wide scale, so unless you can tell me a sport that has gone bankrupt because of highly paid superstars, then there is no "bubble" in sports.

[Andrew Hope]

Breaking news - F1 drivers make more money than the fans that give them all their money, and the fans are jealous.

[faaaz]

Breaking news - F1 drivers make more money than the fans that give them all their money, and the fans are jealous.

[olliek88]

Is there anyone else who thinks that such earnings are shameful and disgusting?

Nope, sure its a lot but then how much money you earn is relevant to the amount of money available in what ever sector you happen to work in, Football, F1, NBA or whatever generate huge sums of money and its only natural that alot of the people working in these sports will see a cut of this. Just look at the fact that, compared with 5 or 6 years ago, the top drivers of today actually earn less then the top drivers from the boom period did.

The fact that doctors or soldiers or teachers or, in my case, electricians earn peanuts compared with top sports men is very much influenced by the amount of cash in each sector, as well as many other things obviously. I can understand why people get worked up by the money that is being paid to top athletes but its the way the world works and i can deal with it.

Also the fact that F1 drivers work far harder than most Joe Bloggs do, none of use can appreciate just how hard it is to be a Formula 1 driver and i suspect that how ever hard we might think it is or isn't you can probably times it by 3 and you might get nearer to the reality, we all love the idea of being a F1 driver but the reality is very different.

[J. Edlund]

I wont even consider that first sentence as a serious comment, it is ridiculous beyond reason. And I don't think there is a bubble in sports, it is simply risk and reward. If one sporting club goes down because they invested too highly in a player then thats the way it goes. Bubble is on an industry wide scale, so unless you can tell me a sport that has gone bankrupt because of highly paid superstars, then there is no "bubble" in sports.

The fact that you don't take the first sentence serious say more about your comment than mine; the risks in F1 these days are small. No matter where you work, there is always the risk of fatality at work. I wouldn't put F1 drivers at a higher risk than for instance fighter pilots, test pilots, test drivers or drivers of emergency vehicles; workers that doesn't have multimillion salaries. Neither have many F1 drivers by the way. The comparison between F1 drivers and fighter pilots (assuming western air forces) is particulary good since both have traditionally been high risk jobs that lately have become safe. If you had decided to become a fighter pilot in the 1950'ties I would say that you would have had a roughly one in four chance to become accident statistics.

There is a salary bubble in sports, all the talk about risk and reward is just a bunch of crap from someone with poor understanding of economics. You can see the bubble in the economic state many clubs are in, were some clubs spend more money on athlete saleries than they have income. You can also see it in the exponential salary growth in some sports and the various cost caps introduced in sports to keep salaries down. At the end of the day, the paychecks of athletes are payed with income from fans and sponsors and there are limits to what they are willing to and can afford to pay. Today, the only reason why we haven't seen more bankrupcies than one would expect if these "teams", "clubs" and so on were regular companies, is the fact that many of them have found themselves rich "sugar daddys" to pay for the ever increasing debts they collect. Sometimes even the tax payers money are used.

An article that describes the poor economic state of european soccer, but the problem is hardly unique for european soccer:
http://espn.go.com/s...l-eating-itself

The economy of these clubs are not too unlike the "tragedy of the commons". In self interrest these clubs spend money they don't have so they can be successful, yet it is clear that this isn't sustainable in the long term. But still they continue spending hoping for incomes that never realise.

[J. Edlund]

Nope, sure its a lot but then how much money you earn is relevant to the amount of money available in what ever sector you happen to work in, Football, F1, NBA or whatever generate huge sums of money and its only natural that alot of the people working in these sports will see a cut of this. Just look at the fact that, compared with 5 or 6 years ago, the top drivers of today actually earn less then the top drivers from the boom period did.

The fact that doctors or soldiers or teachers or, in my case, electricians earn peanuts compared with top sports men is very much influenced by the amount of cash in each sector, as well as many other things obviously. I can understand why people get worked up by the money that is being paid to top athletes but its the way the world works and i can deal with it.

Also the fact that F1 drivers work far harder than most Joe Bloggs do, none of use can appreciate just how hard it is to be a Formula 1 driver and i suspect that how ever hard we might think it is or isn't you can probably times it by 3 and you might get nearer to the reality, we all love the idea of being a F1 driver but the reality is very different.

The whole problem is that football, F1 and "whatever" doesn't generate the huge sums of income you and many people think they do. People simply get fooled by the glamour of it all. There's a reason why it is said that "to make a small fortune in F1 you need to start with a big one".

[Andy35]

Kobe Bryant
LeBron James

I have no idea who these chaps are but they have names straight out of a Mills and Boon novel.



Mums and dads eh

Regards

Troy

[Cowboy4Milkman]

Breaking news - F1 drivers make more money than the fans that give them all their money, and the fans are jealous.

Hahaaa best post

[CSquared]

Nice to know we've got so many libertarians, free-market purists, and Ayn Rand disciples on this board.

Danger's got nothing at all to do with what they're paid. Unless you think Alonso takes on more danger than Petrov. Or you think golf is dangerous.

[SCUDmissile]

Kobe Bryant
LeBron James

I have no idea who these chaps are but they have names straight out of a Mills and Boon novel.



Mums and dads eh

Regards

Troy

they are some of the best basketball players, and if you are a liverpool fan, one of your shareholders!

[olliek88]

The whole problem is that football, F1 and "whatever" doesn't generate the huge sums of income you and many people think they do. People simply get fooled by the glamour of it all. There's a reason why it is said that "to make a small fortune in F1 you need to start with a big one".

Its true that its not cheap to run a F1 team, however, as i said F1 does generate alot of money.

http://www.f1fanatic...f1-income-17bn/

[faaaz]

The fact that you don't take the first sentence serious say more about your comment than mine; the risks in F1 these days are small. No matter where you work, there is always the risk of fatality at work. I wouldn't put F1 drivers at a higher risk than for instance fighter pilots, test pilots, test drivers or drivers of emergency vehicles; workers that doesn't have multimillion salaries. Neither have many F1 drivers by the way. The comparison between F1 drivers and fighter pilots (assuming western air forces) is particulary good since both have traditionally been high risk jobs that lately have become safe. If you had decided to become a fighter pilot in the 1950'ties I would say that you would have had a roughly one in four chance to become accident statistics.

There is a salary bubble in sports, all the talk about risk and reward is just a bunch of crap from someone with poor understanding of economics. You can see the bubble in the economic state many clubs are in, were some clubs spend more money on athlete saleries than they have income. You can also see it in the exponential salary growth in some sports and the various cost caps introduced in sports to keep salaries down. At the end of the day, the paychecks of athletes are payed with income from fans and sponsors and there are limits to what they are willing to and can afford to pay. Today, the only reason why we haven't seen more bankrupcies than one would expect if these "teams", "clubs" and so on were regular companies, is the fact that many of them have found themselves rich "sugar daddys" to pay for the ever increasing debts they collect. Sometimes even the tax payers money are used.

An article that describes the poor economic state of european soccer, but the problem is hardly unique for european soccer:
http://espn.go.com/s...l-eating-itself

The economy of these clubs are not too unlike the "tragedy of the commons". In self interrest these clubs spend money they don't have so they can be successful, yet it is clear that this isn't sustainable in the long term. But still they continue spending hoping for incomes that never realise.

I agree with you, other jobs are dangerous..but that doesn't take away from the fact that F1 drivers are constantly faced with death, and this is for our entertainment. You clearly have no understanding of economics whatsoever. I suggest you look up the terms "confirmation bias", and "black swan event" before you make baseless claims on how F1 is not risky since you have not seen a death in recent years. Even that article of yours suggest "Risky business" , which is risk and reward for spending on players, however deluded the CEOs are. Sure, they probably shouldn't spend that much given their incomes, but they do.

Since you understand tragedy of the common you would also understand elementary game theory, which would suggest these clubs fight for the best possible athlete, and the incentive is by providing high income. I couldn't give a less about the financial state of European football clubs, but I think F1 drivers deserve their income because that is the fundamental value of their worth, which is not inflated by a "bubble".

[teejay]

Yes when we are talking about Tiger Woods and some NBA stars yes. I completely agree with you.

Why NBA guys.

They play 82 games in 8 months, so 2-3 a week. Travel non stop, train non stop, and are under incredible scrutiny for everything they do.

Plus they are used by their owners as a pawn to make money.

One of the main things I see also - sure F1 drivers risk injury every time they are in the car, but in the modern day of F1, how many of them actually hurt themselves seriously? NBA players but the bucket load injure themselves, needing surgery and a year out of the game. They often end their careers with broken bodies, which they carry for the rest of their lives.

Why should they not be rewarded?

Edited by teejay, 04 June 2011 - 07:13.

[Jimisgod]

Pfft, these athletes deserve massive salaries due to their massive work loads, constant training, injury and the fact they are the very best at their given sports. There are far more business people who are poor at what they do, effectively trash companies or run them into the ground and depart in a few years with unimaginable 'golden handshakes' a sportsman would never dream of, that earn more.

[Kraken]

Well over 90% of people in the World will never achieve even close to what they are capable of and, hence, will always complain that others have more luck and earn more than them.

In some countries there are valid excuses. In the majority of first world western countries the only "excuse" is laziness. Never ceases to amaze me the number of people who spend their evenings watching junk on the TV rather than educating themselves.

If I was a team manager I'd say Button looks very good value for money...