Should Stadiums Be Subsidized By Taxpayers?

[Dominator83]

I don't have a problem if a city has an agreement to loan money to a franchise in order to build a stadium, but what the NFL has been doing is criminal. They threaten to move teams if the public doesn't finance an arena, and have used L.A. for YEARS as leverage. The NFL can easily finance arenas, but they continue to rob taxpaying citizens who get little to no value out the arena. Can you imagine not even being a sports fan knowning your taxes are going to a stadium rather than scholarships, schools, and healthcare? It's complete madness.

You always hear the argument from the owners perspective that stadiums and arenas bring jobs to the area. These are some of the lowest forms of employment though. Seasonal jobs, minimum wage, part time for the most part. The rare exception is when a guy like Lebron James emerges, he actually stimulates the economy. I have a friend from Cleveland, her family owns a restaurant in the area, and she said that when Lebron left for Miami it really impacted the economy and her families restaurant took a huge hit.

I don't understand how cities can just write a check, get very little back, and watch billionaires collect revenue from concerts, games, etc. I think cities should be getting a huge cut in revenue until the city gets what it put in in the first place.

The funny thing is LA now has 2 teams, NONE of which is the team the city REALLY wanted, the raiders. Im sure that 90% of LA and surronding area residents would trade both the rams and Chargers for 1 Raiders.

[Kurosawa0]

Sure. When everyone has health care, there's no crime, everyone has a job, libraries are on every block, schools are the best in the world and teachers, cops, military and firefighters are all millionaires. Yes, then we can have taxes fund stadiums where billionaires' sports teams play.

[makubesu]

One thing to remember about pro leagues is that they're basically monopolies. They engage in all kinds of anti competitive practices to make sure they're the only show in town. Usually we think of this in terms of the players, and that of course why they have a union to help protect them. Cities should think the same way. If there were five robust pro basketball leagues in the US, threats to leave by a team from one league would be matched by promises to come by other leagues. But since we allow a single league to dominate, cities get held hostage.

The solution is to just to act like the players. Have the major cities and together, and agree to a set of standards for stadium funding to make sure cities come out ahead.


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[Soupman]

No.

Taxation is theft unless they agree to it.

[OrlandoHouston]

yes if the people who vote yes are the only ones who get taxed. its not a public good

and because thats not gonna happen, hell no

[NBARocks]

y'all already subsidize the bailout. what's a few dollars more?

lol. y'all think you're still free when in reality, the elites have enslaved you in debt in the form of taxes.

[GoBobs]

It's just another example of the powerful using their power to take advantage of the powerless.

Should big companies be able to bargain for decades of tax breaks while small companies get nothing? Of course not, but big companies can threaten to move jobs out of state.

Should big companies get bailouts while mom and pop businesses go belly up during hard times? Of course not.

Publicly funded stadiums are morally wrong. The whole thing is shameful and everyone knows it but no one seems to be able to stop it.

Power accumulates in one direction until the system becomes unstable and eventually topples.

Every government is burdened with debt and that debt is money the masses owe to the wealthy who loaned money to those governments.

[coldfish]

These sports leagues are state created monopolies. The NBA, for example, has total control over how many major league basketball teams there are in the US. Overall, that's illegal but the US has decided not to prosecute these organizations under anti trust rules and created special loopholes for them.

Why does this matter? Because the leagues make sure there are less teams than there are markets wanting a team. This creates bidding wars between cities where the cities have to offer sweetheart deals to get teams.

Screw that. These leagues should have two choices:
- Stop taking public money
- Get sued and be forced to let anyone who wants to create a team into their club. If your city doesn't have a team, someone would just create one.

[qm22]

No, they shouldn't, assuming previous analysis stands that the economic returns for cities never come.

The owners in no way need them, they aren't essential for an NBA team either. The Pistons moved to a privately constructed/owned stadium in the 80s, and only in the last 5 years (IIRC) had any major renovations. It also did fine, apparently, for hosting events outside of the NBA games.

Never heard a player or fan complain, because it served the function of hosting a basketball team. I don't argue there may be a lot of cool improvements to make, but they're trivial for basketball reasons. So, I'd guess the major "need" for renovations are for things that would host better services or advertising or other things the owner can do to make profit...

Half of the problem is when an owner threatens to leave the voters start threatening politicians. Seems voters do wield some influence after all, if only Americans could be bothered to mobilize for education, break up cable monopolies, and maybe demand some infrastructure improvements or world peace... However, perhaps part of the problem is a lack of serious attention to analyzing the pros and cons in American media, leaving no real group motivated to stand against the sports fanatics who don't want their team moved.

[Froob]

Tax payers should get it in for free if they pay for it...

[Pointgod]

This isn't any different than a city of state offering tax breaks to corporations & companies to set up shop there.

EG, Canada offers massive financial advantages to the games industry, which is why you find so much of the game industry going north of the border instead of staying in the US.

Ontario in particular has been attracting a significant number of game companies to the region by setting up generous tax incentives. I’ve had the opportunity to launch six tech companies on both sides of the border, and as someone who has mostly lived out of a suitcase, could have easily set up Big Viking Games anywhere in the world. But in the end, without a doubt, I chose to build the company out of Ontario.

Last year, through the support of the Ontario Media Development Corporation (OMDC), gaming companies in Ontario received back between 35 percent to 40 percent of all dollars invested on developers, artists, and marketing costs. When you’re operating a company that’s comprised of 90 percent artists and developers like we are, that’s a huge sum of money.

On the federal side, the Industrial Research Assistance Program (IRAP) and the Scientific Research and Experimental Development Tax Incentive Program (SR&ED) offers new innovative tech companies from $50,000 to $500,000-plus each year to supplement development costs. What’s more, the Business Development Bank of Canada is a federally owned bank with more than $1 billion under management whose mandate is “to help create and develop Canadian businesses.” They aggressively support video game start-ups within Canada.

If a city or state wants a particular type of business, and the NBA is a business, they will use their tax money to make an attractive offer. And in the case of the NBA, it's arenas.

You do know Ontario is a province right not a city? And this case you cite is in reference to a whole industry not just one business. Look at the individual income tax rates in Canada and Ontario. The reason they can offer tax breaks to corporations is that they know they can recoup that and more through individual taxes.

[DoItALL9]

https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2017/07/13/these-teens-went-searching-years-funding-for-community-ice-rink-they-found-out-something-about-garden-that-one-had-realized/HjmmadXhxJcvpvkGKmXsYK/amp.html

Ridiculous

[DoItALL9]

No. Absolutely not. Even considering this is idiotic. Build some dam facilities for kids instead.

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.....aaaaaaand then you lose the team.

unless WE ALL decided not to pay

[Cmon_Son-_-]

Hell no **** Jeffery Loria

[stilldropin20]

If your state is going to the gutter, and overall infrastructure, healthcare, and education budgets are running on deficits, do you still believe that the public should shoulder the burden of billionaires? I'm actually surprised that this isn't illegal in the US.

should be a federal law against it. then teams would not be able to threaten to leave. billionaires should be not be given tax breaks. period. anywhere in the entire world. i have nothing against millionaire. hard working innovative people should be rewarded. but millionaires should be capped at say a net worth of 20M. there comes a point when you are just hoarding.

[realEAST]

Above all, it is more than just arenas - new owners are basically gifted what become pretty valuable pieces of land that surround new arenas, which usually make bigger profit for them than arena and team itself.

Not to mention that deals made with local community in process are basically robberies - Bulls United Center is one of the rare examples where local community successfully organized and got at least some value from the whole deal, but they were first offered a disgraceful settlement too.
(most recent example being relocation of Nets)

But in most cases the process of negotitation is carried individually and people who just aren't prepared for carrying out such transactions end up big time losers.

It's predatory capitalism.

In all that private capital has all the backings from the majority or all local political structures, who in turn work against their own citizens from whose taxes they subsidize these arenas in first place, moreso since most of those same citizens will never set foot in those arenas.

Yep, brave new world.

[qm22]

No. Absolutely not. Even considering this is idiotic. Build some dam facilities for kids instead.

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.....aaaaaaand then you lose the team.

unless WE ALL decided not to pay

It would never happen unanimously, so teams would move. IMO best to accept it and move on. There will still be an NBA, still be other sports to go out to in your locale. Only 30 locations will have a nearby team anyway, just live without one. I think my surroundings would be better if the government were committed to infrastructure investments which bring returns, whether in education, quality of life, or economic aspects, and I can still watch the NBA on TV or go to live games less often.

It sucks a bit for the hardcore fan or the people who may often go to games, but at least there will always be local university sports programs which never move, have ties to your community, and generally are made up of people from the area.

[coldfish]

Above all, it is more than just arenas - new owners are basically gifted what become pretty valuable pieces of land that surround new arenas, which usually make bigger profit for them than arena and team itself.

Not to mention that deals made with local community in process are basically robberies - Bulls United Center is one of the rare examples where local community successfully organized and got at least some value from the whole deal, but they were first offered a disgraceful settlement too.
(most recent example being relocation of Nets)

But in most cases the process of negotitation is carried individually and people who just aren't prepared for carrying out such transactions end up big time losers.

It's predatory capitalism.

In all that private capital has all the backings from the majority or all local political structures, who in turn work against their own citizens from whose taxes they subsidize these arenas in first place, moreso since most of those same citizens will never set foot in those arenas.

Yep, brave new world.

I disagree that this is predatory capitalism. In any type of capitalist system, people would be creating teams and just filling up markets until there was no threat of teams leaving for different markets.

This is something worse and uglier. Corporatism or economic fascism where the government gets in bed with the wealthy private sector.

https://fee.org/articles/economic-fascism/

When people hear the word “fascism” they naturally think of its ugly racism and anti-Semitism as practiced by the totalitarian regimes of Mussolini and Hitler. But there was also an economic policy component of fascism, known in Europe during the 1920s and ‘30s as “corporatism,” that was an essential ingredient of economic totalitarianism as practiced by Mussolini and Hitler. So-called corporatism was adopted in Italy and Germany during the 1930s and was held up as a “model” by quite a few intellectuals and policy makers in the United States and Europe. A version of economic fascism was in fact adopted in the United States in the 1930s and survives to this day. In the United States these policies were not called “fascism” but “planned capitalism.”

[jefe]

I don't think there is an easy "yes" or "no." I think it depends alot on how the business relationship of the team and the city is structured.

[Scalabrine]

Of course the answers is no, but the bottom line is pro sports teams are a commodity. They add value to a city.

And if cities and their citizens are unwilling to fork out public money to subsidize their stadiums, then the teams' owners will threaten to move the team to a city that will. This has been going on for years now. It's nothing new. The question for these cities and their citizens more often than not is, "How much do you value your team? Are you willing to pay to keep it?"

On a side note, Joey "Lightyears" Lacob has gotten the new Warriors new $1B arena to be completely privately funded. Now the public loves that while other team owners and the NBA are likely less enthused about it because it sets such a "great example" for others to follow.

I don't know if there is any evidence suggesting that sports teams add value to a city.

https://www.marketplace.org/2015/03/19/business/are-pro-sports-teams-economic-winners-cities

“If you ever had a consensus in economics, this would be it," says Michael Leeds, a sports economist at Temple University. "There is no impact."

Leeds studied Chicago – as big a sports town as there is, with five major teams.

“If every sports team in Chicago were to suddenly disappear, the impact on the Chicago economy would be a fraction of 1 percent,” Leeds says. “A baseball team has about the same impact on a community as a midsize department store.”

There are plenty of more articles suggesting the same with the numbers to back it up. I'd love to see a counter argument...