Former President Barack Obama believes college athletes should be paid just like the athletic directors and coaches whose salaries the young competitors often help to subsidize.
Obama, appearing Thursday on “The Bill Simmons Podcast” alongside Bakari Sellers, talked about the risks football and basketball players face getting hurt while helping their schools and broadcasters make billions of dollars each year.
“I think that the amount of money that is being made at the college level, the risks that, let’s say, college football players are being subjected to and the fact that for many of these colleges, what these young people are doing are subsidizing athletic director salaries, coach salaries,” Obama said, USA Today reported. “All of that argues for a better economic arrangement for them, and I think there is a way of doing that that doesn’t completely eliminate the traditions and the love we all have for college sports.”
On Wednesday, the Supreme Court announced it will review a lower court ruling in an antitrust lawsuit brought by student-athletes against the NCAA to remove caps on education-related compensation and benefits in Division I football and basketball programs.