“Major league baseball as an entity is over $10 billion. Will it yield championships? Some studies suggest that baseball teams with big disparities in salary tend to perform worse.īig picture, though, the prosperity of professional baseball and its best players tracks back global economic changes. One can also debate - and many already are - the specifics of Harper’s contract. Meanwhile, baseball’s “luxury tax” structure and roster size distinguish it from other professional leagues - which helps explain why Harper will make more than a player of equivalent stature in the National Football League. There’s, of course, more at play in the specifics of Harper’s deal.Īn increase in disposable income has helped make sports and other entertainment products more profitable. “What Rosen’s getting at in 1981 is capturing part of what this story is about.” “Relative to the past, a superstar today is worth a lot more,” he said. In this file photo, Harper warms up in the batters box during a baseball game against the New York Mets at Nationals Park, Sunday, Sept. And those same people can watch just about any baseball game they want, which is great news if you run the world’s best baseball league.īryce Harper has been signed to the Philadelphia Phillies. People all over the world can see a Bryce Harper home run. That theory translates to baseball, said sports economist David Berri, a professor at Southern Utah University. Where you once had a sprawling cohort of vaudevillians, Rosen pointed out, you now have a small handful of highly paid, stand-up comedy superstars. Radio, television, and now the internet allow the most distinguished people in comedy, music and other fields to reach more people. “But this would also reduce the spoils available to the less gifted in the business.” Rosen “argued that technological changes would allow the best performers in a given field to serve a bigger market and thus reap a greater share of its revenue,” wrote the New York Times’ Eduardo Porter in a 2011 book. WHYY thanks our sponsors - become a WHYY sponsor
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