Athletes are Overpaid

Athletes are indeed overpaid. According to the â€Å"May 2007 National Occupational Employment and Wage Estimates†, chief executives, managers, legislators, public relations persons, farmers, ranchers, educators, real estate brokers, hospital managers, and other â€Å"management occupations† only earn approximately â€Å"$40.60 per hour† (US Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2007, n.p.).The same is also true for agents of artists and athletes, logisticians, financial analysts, and other â€Å"business and financial operations occupations† who only receives about â€Å"26.87 per hour† (US Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2007, n.p.).Similarly, software engineers, systems analyst, computer programmers, and other workers who belong to the category, â€Å"computer and mathematical science occupations† only get â€Å"$33.21 per hour† (US Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2007, n.p.).Even landscape architects and civil engineers just get â€Å"$31.14 hourly † (US Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2007, n.p.). In addition to that, food scientists, economists, psychologists are only paid â€Å"$26.59† (US Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2007, n.p.). Substance abuse counselors and mental health counselors get even much lower since they are only paid â€Å"$17.87 hourly† (US Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2007, n.p.).This means that people who have the aforementioned occupations earn only about $40,000 – $90,000 annually (US Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2007, n.p.). Meanwhile, athletes earn millions; in fact, â€Å"an average NBA player†, for instance earns â€Å"$2.2 million† (CBS Interactive Inc., 1997, n.p.).Farmers for instance play a large role in feeding people, hospital managers contribute largely in saving lives, financial analysts help a lot in making the economy flourish, engineers and architectures build shelters which is one of man’s basic need as well, mental health counselors/psychologists he lp people keep their sanity, while logisticians ensure the security of the country and yet these employees are only receive about $40,000 – $90,000 annually (US Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2007, n.p.).Considering that athletes are paid for punching someone, running, shooting/kicking a ball, etc or for entertainment’s sake only and taking into consideration that they are not even playing a role in saving people’s lives or their job does not even require too much intelligence or thinking (unlike other people for instance educators, doctors, etc) yet these athletes receive extremely high salaries, then this only means that indeed, â€Å"athletes are overpaid† (US Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2007, n.p.).ReferencesCBS Interactive Inc. (1997). Blacks Top Salary List of NBA Players.Retrieved November 24, 2008 from http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1355/is_n3_v93/ai_20097766U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. (2007). Wage by Area and Occupation. Retrieved Novem ber 24, 2008 from   http://www.bls.gov/bls/blswage.htm