KQED's Forum Pay for College Athletes Kicks Off New Era of College Sports
Aug 22, 2025
Daniel Rascher is a sports economist and professor at the University of San Francisco, Rachel Bachman is a senior reporter at The Wall Street Journal, and Henry Organ is a co-founder and agent at Disruptive. They discuss the groundbreaking changes in college sports compensation following a pivotal court ruling. Explore the tension between major and minor programs regarding financial inequalities. The conversation addresses the impact of NIL rights, the evolving nature of athlete amateurism, and the exciting new opportunities for student-athletes as the college football season begins.
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Broadcasts Made College Sports Big Business
- College sports grew into a multibillion-dollar commercial enterprise while treating athletes as unpaid amateurs for decades.
- Broadcast rights, especially college football TV deals, drove top programs' revenues into the hundreds of millions.
Recruiting Fueled Facility Arms Races
- Schools funneled money into coaches and flashy facilities to recruit because direct pay was banned.
- That created inefficiency compared with paying athletes directly.
NIL Then School Revenue Payments
- The NIL era (since ~2021) let athletes sign sponsorships and profit from their name, image, and likeness.
- The House settlement then allowed schools to pay athletes directly from athletic revenues.