Getting Paid

MY FAVORITE COLLEGE FOOTBALL TEAM had several terrible seasons in a row, seasons in which they won only a couple of games, and lost nearly a dozen. I, and all the other fans, were shocked and dismayed, especially because over the decades this football team had maintained a generally good record, was usually highly ranked, won most of its games, and we had long become accustomed to succcess. Then, our very good coach got caught having an affair with a college student, was fired, and the new coach didn't measure up, and failed to continue the success. The losing seasons began. We went through several coaches in several years, all of whom were very highly regarded within their profession, but the fit was never right, and none of them could manage to get the program back on track. We learned the hard way that a truly good college football coach is very hard to find. Indeed, a successful football coach must not only be a good coach, he must be a good teacher, motivator, organizer, and, above all, a good recruiter. He must have the charisma, and the communications skills to entice the best high school football players to sign on to his program, competing against dozens of other colleges and universities and for top talent, many of which have very charismatic persuasive coaches. Finally, after years of struggle and failure, my team found a successful coach, one with all the necessary attributes. He was not a well known highly regarded coach, but had been "lost in the shuffle", overlooked, until our athletic director had the insight to pluck him out of another university, where he was an assistant coach, and make him the head man. He had never been a head coach before, and was up in age, but he turned out to be extraordinary in putting together a good football team, almost immediately. He was so happy to be given the opportunity that when he was hired he said that, no, it was not about the money, it was about the joy of having the job, and that he would have been happy to do it for free, even though his initial salary was more than a million dollars a year. Then, after two successful seasons, he hired an agent. The agent submitted a proposal to the ahletic director, a proposal of a guaranteed seven year contract, for a total of fifty milion dollars, a little over seven million per year. Quite a raise for a man who was willing to work for free. The proposal is currently on the table. The university has not yet responded. Most likely, he will either get what he is asking, or close to it. A successful college football team makes tens of millions of dollars a year for the universtiy in ticket sales and television revenue, and as seemingly exorbitant as a good coaches salary is, economically, its well worth it. How mcuh is a good first grade teacher worth, to society?