Posted on 06/03/2012 3:45:28 PM PDT by wewillnotcomply
Professional sports teams are getting money from taxpayers, and it isn't anything new.
The Minnesota Vikings will receive half a billion dollars from Minnesota taxpayers, as Tim Carney highlights here.
Samuel Staley at the Reason Foundation's Out of Control Policy blog writes about the cronyism occurring when professional sports teams are subsidized by taxpayers, and gives several examples:
Professional sports continues to be crony capitalism at its worst, using its oligopoly status to extract rents from taxpayers through elected officials. The reality is that precious little evidence exists suggesting that professional sports teams boost economic growth for cities, let alone neghborhoods, and the so-called benefits reflect the low bar used by local officials to claim success.
For more stories about cronyism visit our page here.
I will remember who supported this come Nov...
What a waste of my money.
I think the NFL has gotten far more money from not having a team in Los Angeles than if they had one there. If a team moves to LA, they will get taxpayerchumps to pay for one stadium. With the threat of moving to LA, they can get 32 free stadiums. The treat of moving a team to Portland, Oregon (next larget metropolitan area that isn't already in range of a NFL team) just doesn't scare taxpayerchumps like a threat to move to LA.
FYI.
Just a guess, but it probably has something to do with professional politicians.
I agree that sports should not be subsidized with tax dollars. We already pay for public sports during sixteen years of education, counting four years of college.
Why are taxpayers paying for bike paths and hiking trails? I’ve never ridden on a bike path or walked on a marked hiking trail.
Why are taxpayers paying for public transportation? I’ve been on a city bus once, a greyhound once and a train once.
Any taxpayer money, subsidies, tax credits, etc. for private business should be banned, period.
There is simply too much opportunity for graft.
They shouldn't, it should be paid for by those who ride it.
It's the votes that the taxpayers are paying for.
Pure Tax Slavery.
40 cents of every dollar on most folks cable TV bill goes towards sports programming. Many teams no longer care whether they put butts in the stands or not, or even win for that matter...because the TV contracts are so lucrative. Think I read that the Los Angeles Angels(of Anaheim) TV contract was worth $3 billion over 20 years?
From what I’ve read, urban public transportation is considered to be a great success if its rider funded at around 25%. The people mover in Detroit is rider funded at a rate of about 7%.
Entertainment-addicted, celebrity-infatuated people get what they deserve.
They see 75,000 people shelling out for tickets, beer, and hot dogs and consider that economic growth. No thought for what the money might have otherwise been spent on.
They can blame me. I am ok with that. I didn’t see any supporters of the Vikings stepping up to personally write the check for the stadium.
On the other hand, any sports venue that attracts large numbers of people from outside the region actually does provide huge economic benefits for the region. Just ask anyone who runs a business in Daytona or Talladega when a couple of hundred thousand people travel to the area during the weekend of a NASCAR race, or anyone who runs a business near Churchill Downs during Kentucky Derby week.
One way the NFL helps individual teams "inflate" the economic benefits of these new stadiums is by promising them a Super Bowl within the first few years after the stadium opens. This is why Jacksonville hosted a Super Bowl a few years back even though it was totally unsuitable for that sort of event, and why the new MetLife Stadium in the New Jersey Meadowlands is going to host the Super Bowl in a couple of years even though NFL policy doesn't allow outdoor Super Bowls in that kind of climate.
The Vikings will never be successful unless they learn to fly on their own.
When politicians look at the 3-D computer model of their luxury box seats in the new stadium, how could they possibly vote NOT to spend your money?
Stealing from Each Other: How the Welfare State Robs Americans of Money and Spirit [Hardcover]
Edgar K. Browning (Author)
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