Compensating College Athletes

As college sports has grown into a multibillion-dollar industry, the push to allow its athletes to receive a share of those revenues has gained momentum in legislative and judicial arenas. In the past year, three states have enacted legislation to allow college athletes to profit from the use of their names, images and likenesses (NIL), and 31 others are considering such laws. The trend challenges the long-established principle of strict amateurism enforced by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). The impetus for change is driven in part by how much money college sports programs now earn from broadcast rights, ticket sales and donations — $14.8 billion during the 2017-18 school year alone. In addition, studies have shown a vast disparity between how much players receive in scholarships and how much athletic departments spend on themselves. The NCAA argues that laws allowing athletes to profit from their college performances raise constitutional issues, would erase the distinction between college and professional athletics and would give some schools an unfair recruiting advantage.