Not on My Dime

 Proponents for an increase in the minimum wage generally favor a figure of $15 an hour.  By way of contrast, the minimum salary for major-league baseball last season was $507,500.  That’s nice work, if you can get it.

Unlike many local, state and national politicians, to say nothing of their business buddies, I have more of a problem with the bigger figure.  Too much of that $507,500 comes from fans.  Too much of a team’s payroll is derived the same way, for that matter.  I can’t speak for other people, but I personally object to kicking in to help pay for the likes of Adam LaRoche, and I was none too happy contributing to the salaries of Albert Belle and Adam Dunn.  How/why do I lend out the cash? you might ask.  And the answer is, through a publicly funded stadium and the sweetheart lease that goes with it.

If the Red Sox want to sign David Price or the Cubs Jason Heyward, that falls on their fans and no one else.  So it goes for any team that owns its venue.  But with the vast majority of sports’ franchises, the public foots the bill for where the teams play, and gets next to nothing tangible—as in cold, hard cash, as opposed to shots of the downtown skyline from the Goodyear blimp—in return.  Chicagoans are supposed to believe they didn’t pay anything for the Cell because it was funded by a hotel tax, but guess what?  Tax money that goes to a new stadium is tax money unavailable for schools, potholes or parks.  Oh, and guess who pays a hotel tax when they go watch a game in other cities? 

Baseball isn’t playing the extortion game much these days; that “honor” falls to the NFL.  The Raiders, Rams and Chargers are all threatening to move, leaving the cities of Oakland, St. Louis and San Diego to trip over themselves offering new deals for the respective teams to stay.  Raiders’ fans are loyal to the point of crazy and beyond; I wonder how many of them have gotten skin cancer from the crap they put on their faces season after season.  No matter, the team wants a new home, and loyal fans will get with the program, if they know what’s good for them.