Mr. Stern: where does it say that all NBA teams have to make a profit?

[RazorBaLade]

Steve Jobs makes $1 per year in salary. He is the lowest paid employee at Apple, going by salary.

Apple is owned by many people, shareholders. Jobs has a pretty high amount in the company, maybe even 40% or something. Apple is worth 2 billion or so, so he is entitled to 750 million from apple. That means everyone under him, if Apple adopted an NBA system, would be entitled to more than 750 million a piece. This is obviously not the case. semantics wise you got me i guess, he has no salary, but hes paid in stocks.. everyone who works for apple is i think.

College coaches make more money than the presidents of the schools.

There's an example of an employee making more money than an employer.

I believe I said owner, not employer. In any case, I would definitely need a source that the president of a prestigious school makes less money than a coach. But anyways, look at most businesses dude.

walmart. kmart. best buy. sony. NO one makes more money than the person who writes everyone checks. The CEO of Nintendo does not make less money than his assistant. The guy who owns a chain of walmarts does not make less money than the grocery baggers.

What we have, basically, is a system where (if we extremely simplify it) every year, 10 million dollars are made for each team on average. The business makes 10 million. The owner of the business then has to pay his employees, except his employees salary is 20 million. What kind of an employer/owner/CEO would make more money if he retired?

That is freaking ridiculous, right? The players are so totally in the wrong here its insane.

[bagelred]

Mr. Stern: where does it say that all NBA teams have to make a profit?

The Bible, Motherf-cker. Where you think?

"Thou shalt profit from the labor of the coloreds and thus it is said."

[pmj]

In what business does the owner make less money than the employees?

This is a completely false premise. The players aren't just employees, they are THE PRODUCT being sold.

Kobe, Wade, Lebron, etc. are NOT replaceable. They are the best basketball playing PRODUCTS in the world.

Put it this way, I have a lemonade stand. For every $1 in revenue I bring in, it costs me $.57 cents to buy the lemonade mix (players), $.10 cents to lease the place my stand is in (arenas), $.10 to pay an employee to make the lemonade (staff), and so on. Anything left over is my profit.

I can't simply choose to not buy my lemonade mix, the whole point of my business is selling lemonade.

I can't simply buy cheaper lemonade, the whole reason my customers come to me is that I am the ONLY one who sells lemonade this good.

That is why the players should get a bigger % of the pie than owners. They are the whole reason people watch, buy merchandise, etc. I agree they should change some dumb rules with crappy contracts, but the whole notion that owners should get more the players makes no sense to me. The players are your most important "operating cost".

[Sarcastic]

This is a completely false premise. The players aren't just employees, they are THE PRODUCT being sold.

Kobe, Wade, Lebron, etc. are NOT replaceable. They are the best basketball playing PRODUCTS in the world.

Put it this way, I have a lemonade stand. For every $1 in revenue I bring in, it costs me $.57 cents to buy the lemonade mix (players), $.10 cents to lease the place my stand is in (arenas), $.10 to pay an employee to make the lemonade (staff), and so on. Anything left over is my profit.

I can't simply choose to not buy my lemonade mix, the whole point of my business is selling lemonade.

I can't simply buy cheaper lemonade, the whole reason my customers come to me is that I am the ONLY one who sells lemonade this good.

That is why the players should get a bigger % of the pie than owners. They are the whole reason people watch, buy merchandise, etc. I agree they should change some dumb rules with crappy contracts, but the whole notion that owners should get more the players makes no sense to me. The players are your most important "operating cost".

Exactly.

How much money would the league make if its best player was Sasha Vujacic?

[bdreason]

The idea that every team should be guaranteed profits is ridiculous. You realize how high the value of these teams will skyrocket if they strike a deal that guarantee's profitability? Even the largest corporations in the world and most renowned investment firms in the world can't GUARANTEE profits.

[RazorBaLade]

This is a completely false premise. The players aren't just employees, they are THE PRODUCT being sold.

Kobe, Wade, Lebron, etc. are NOT replaceable. They are the best basketball playing PRODUCTS in the world.

Put it this way, I have a lemonade stand. For every $1 in revenue I bring in, it costs me $.57 cents to buy the lemonade mix (players), $.10 cents to lease the place my stand is in (arenas), $.10 to pay an employee to make the lemonade (staff), and so on. Anything left over is my profit.

I can't simply choose to not buy my lemonade mix, the whole point of my business is selling lemonade.

I can't simply buy cheaper lemonade, the whole reason my customers come to me is that I am the ONLY one who sells lemonade this good.

That is why the players should get a bigger % of the pie than owners. They are the whole reason people watch, buy merchandise, etc. I agree they should change some dumb rules with crappy contracts, but the whole notion that owners should get more the players makes no sense to me. The players are your most important "operating cost".

Here's the thing. The only businesses where the product is sentient are sports, films and music. Every where else, like in something like a grocery store, that carries produce, technically the produce is the reason that people come there. So the produce makes the most money. But farmers are the ones who create the produce, and there is no CEO that makes less money than a farmer. So everything besides those 3 things pretty much is no doubt employer makes more money than employee.

Now lets look at the film and music industry. For music we have this:



A system where the artist makes SO MUCH less money than the owner of the record label.

In movies? Again, no actor or producer or writer makes as much money as their boss, CEO of SONY or warner brothers does.

So we now have all regular businesses, and 2/3 entertainment driven businesses where the owners make more than the employees. Lets look at sports. I don't know about football and baseball, so someone will have to educate me on that, but I know the NHL had a lockout a while ago that again sent the profits back into the favor of the owners. In soccer the owners of clubs make more money as well.

So basically every business besides the NBA has an owner over employer situation. I'll adress your lemonade example hella fast in the next post dont wanna make this too long

[RazorBaLade]

Put it this way, I have a lemonade stand. For every $1 in revenue I bring in, it costs me $.57 cents to buy the lemonade mix (players), $.10 cents to lease the place my stand is in (arenas), $.10 to pay an employee to make the lemonade (staff), and so on. Anything left over is my profit.

I can't simply choose to not buy my lemonade mix, the whole point of my business is selling lemonade.

I can't simply buy cheaper lemonade, the whole reason my customers come to me is that I am the ONLY one who sells lemonade this good.

Because your lemonade is the product, and it does not require salary, this example is totally random.

The best example we can do are actually pimps and prostitutes. The pimp must provide the birth control, and he's selling a product that is the only reason his business exists.. But lo and behold, I've never heard of hookers that make more money than their pimps.

If you have a better example to try to convince me, I'm all ears, but something where you're your own employee and are selling a product that does not require payment in return like a lemonade stand is just silly.

[bdreason]

The 90's called, they want their music industry pie chart back.

[bdreason]

And pimps don't take more than 50%. He makes more than the prostitutes by taking a small % from multiple transactions. That's why pimp's typically have more than one ho.

[iamgine]

I think NBA should be seen as a unity. The teams are owned by the NBA corporation, not the owners. Owners just make an investment to have certain power over the team and get a share of the pie. Kind of like buying stocks in a company. As a unity they make money together, and lose money together.

If the league as a whole make too little money paying the players 57%, then they should definitely fight for a bigger cut.

[Sarcastic]

I think NBA should be seen as a unity. The teams are owned by the NBA corporation, not the owners. Owners just make an investment to have certain power over the team and get a share of the pie. Kind of like buying stocks in a company. As a unity they make money together, and lose money together.

If the league as a whole make too little money paying the players 57%, then they should definitely fight for a bigger cut.

Then NY, LA, and Chicago have to start sharing their money.

[RazorBaLade]

And pimps don't take more than 50%. He makes more than the prostitutes by taking a small % from multiple transactions. That's why pimp's typically have more than one ho.

the point at the end of the day is no one that is the employer makes less money than the employee. in any other business. its ridiculous to have the NBA do that.

[Sarcastic]

the point at the end of the day is no one that is the employer makes less money than the employee. in any other business. its ridiculous to have the NBA do that.

MLB, and NHL. The players make more than the owners.

There are your 2 other businesses.

Now please STFU.

[knicksman]

This is a completely false premise. The players aren't just employees, they are THE PRODUCT being sold.

Kobe, Wade, Lebron, etc. are NOT replaceable. They are the best basketball playing PRODUCTS in the world.

Put it this way, I have a lemonade stand. For every $1 in revenue I bring in, it costs me $.57 cents to buy the lemonade mix (players), $.10 cents to lease the place my stand is in (arenas), $.10 to pay an employee to make the lemonade (staff), and so on. Anything left over is my profit.

I can't simply choose to not buy my lemonade mix, the whole point of my business is selling lemonade.

I can't simply buy cheaper lemonade, the whole reason my customers come to me is that I am the ONLY one who sells lemonade this good.

That is why the players should get a bigger % of the pie than owners. They are the whole reason people watch, buy merchandise, etc. I agree they should change some dumb rules with crappy contracts, but the whole notion that owners should get more the players makes no sense to me. The players are your most important "operating cost".

What the players provide are services. The service to entertain people. The difference between product and services is that the products are tangible like apple while services like surgeries, defending a case by lawyers are intangibles. Players are still employees and if you think they are not replaceable then how come ncaa who has lesser talent than nba has higher ratings than nba. That means that these players can be replaced by ncaa talent which can be paid less while generating higher revenue coz of higher ratings.

[knicksman]

Then NY, LA, and Chicago have to start sharing their money.

The league as a whole is losing money so the amount these big market teams earned isnt enough to cover the loses of those teams.