IZA World of Labor discussion on the economics of sport

IZA World of Labor discussion on the economics of sport with Mike Leeds from Temple University, Lawrence Kahn from Cornell University and Kerry Papps from University of Bradford

The questions in the discussion include:
- Could you generalize about the size of discriminatory outcomes in sports? If not, how about some examples, including from the world’s most important sport—football—which we Americans call soccer?
- Make or buy is a standard question for managers generally? What about in sports—train your own, or poach from other sports franchises?
- How can we measure individual productivity in sports, when, except for golf or tennis or skiing, for examples, the outcome results from team efforts?
- Why should someone with no interest in sports per se care about this? And if they should, what are some additional examples that are readily generalizable?
- Babe Ruth made $100K in his peak year, around double the U.S. President then. (He justified the salary by saying he was more productive than Calvin Coolidge!) Today’s stars in are earning 100 times what the U.S. president is paid. Is The Babe’s explanation still valid, or is there more to the astronomical salaries?

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