Salary cap

[Jimmy Grimble]

Changing the wage system now is going to be far too difficult. I would like to see players earning their wages, e.g depending on last weeks result and performence, but that clearly has its limitations.

It was interesting watching the bloke on SSN talking about this and money in football. He seemed to think that if a team in the mould of Fulham, West Ham or Middlesborough got relegated from the Prem they would end up in serious trouble.

He also stated that he got hold of a certain team's accounts and showed them to an accoutant, the accountant shook his head and claimed that it was unsustainable.

 

[beorhthelm]

pointless since, as said ots both unenforcable and probably illegal. club expenditure based caps might work, except they benefit the larger clubs with bigger grounds and fan bases.

 

[drew]

why does everyone continually criticize players for the money they earn. Is there anyone out there that wouldn't swap places with them. Also, they do not award themselves that money, it is paid by the clubs and they in turn are paid by the likes of Sky. So, anyone out there who subscribes to sky and watches the footie on a Sunday afternoon is contributing to the situation. How many of us have turned down a wage rise?

 

[El Presidente]

It's a ridiculous idea, and would easily be circumvented. All that would happen is that a player would be on the maximum wage from (say) Manchester United, and then would be given a top up from one of United's sponsors to achieve his desired wage.

As much as I have no time for the Prem, the idea is ill conceived and unworkable.

 

[BensGrandad]

A good idea but impractical. I believe that we in the FL are only allowed to pay a % of our total gate revenue but gate revenue is only a fraction of a premier clubs income so what do you include, TV revenue, ok if all clubs are shown on the TV the same number of times. Merchandise what is the prime motive for the last 2 clubs to sign David Beckham. It just would not work and no way could it be enforced tightly enough.

 

[Djmiles]

Yes, but on here we did a poll ages ago and I seem to remember the most popular option was £80,000 +. Or maybe I'm completely wrong...

I wish the average wage WAS £80k!

 

[bhaexpress]

Two American sports have hard caps -- the NFL and the NBA.
Baseball has a soft cap -- a luxury tax.

The issue has been fairly intensively studied in business schools. A longish survey of the literature may be found at the end of this paper, "The Impact of Free Agency and the Salary Cap on Competitive Balance in the National Football League", by a couple of Iowa State University profs.

The impact of salary caps in professional team sports, 1999 paper by a bloke from University of Antwerp.

The Effect of Salary Caps in Professional Team Sports on Social Welfare , 2007, two guys from Zurich.

Proof of the pudding is that nobody dominates either league.

 

[Brighton Breezy]

Of course we would think it is a great idea because we are not Chelsea, Man United or Man City.

I am sure their fans would have a very different view.

Also, probably some sort of European employment law which clubs would challenge.

 

[Da Man Clay]

Average wage is £19,000 per year.

I thought it was 21k?

 

[Walkers Cajun Squirrel]

I thought it was 21k?

I think that is only full time work. If you think there are some part time 12 years olds on £300per year. That drags the average wage down.

 

[Curious Orange]

I wonder how much difference it would make if the Premier League adopted the total wages as a % of club turnover that has been adopted by the FL and the Conference?

 

[Mendoza]

is there a website with the annual/weekly wages per Premier League club?

Would be interesting to look at, and see how much money is spent on these players

 

[Jimmy Grimble]

is there a website with the annual/weekly wages per Premier League club?

Would be interesting to look at, and see how much money is spent on these players

1,440 million a year

 

[Mellotron]

Nah, wouldn't work.

 

[supaseagull]

I think the theory behind it is good...but it would have to be world wide and sanctioned and agreed by FIFA and all of the other governing bodies so that one particular area in the world doesn't dominate world football.

The part of me that thinks it wouldn't work is that instead of ridiculous wages, you'd have ridiculous signing on fees and bonus payments instead.

The way the rich clubs would get around this is that instead of them paying a player £60k a week in salary, clubs would pay £30k a week and then £30k appearance bonuses! so you're just back in the same situtation you are now!

 

[Hatterlovesbrighton]

I'd far rather the players got the money than the owners.

Clubs can afford to pay large amounts of money to their players because they are generating large amounts of cash from ticket sales, merchandising, tv and other income. If they didn't get this money then wages would come down.

Salary caps can be useful, but more for evening out the ability of sides rather than restricting pay.

 

[Pavilionaire]

Great idea, one problem. The horse has already bolted and the door's been left swinging in the breeze...

It works well in the USA. No one or two teams have dominated any of their major salary-capped sports in the last 20 years. Compare that to the Man Utd/Arsenal dominance of 1992-2005 and Man Utd/Chelsea dominance thereafter.