Highest Paid Public Employees

Below, one of those info-graphics that are so popular out here in the internet. Note that the highest paid public employee in almost every state is a college football or basketball coach. Good or bad?

The football coach at my alma mater, the University of Illinois, makes a cool $1.6 million. So does the basketball coach. That’s .8 mill per football win, based on last year’s 2-10 performance. Tim Beckman, our football coach, said the Illini coaching job was a “gold mine,” and, at least for him, it is.

John Groce, our basketball coach, is earning his keep. He coaxed a previously underperforming group to a first round victory in the NCAA tournament.

Who should be paid more? Politicians? Teachers? Well, I guess you could make the argument that football and basketball coaches are paid way too much.

If you are an Ohio State grad, you might be looking at this in a different way, which is to say from a vantage point of success. The Buckeyes always win big in football and basketball.

Silly old goats like me can be counted on to tune in when the alma mater plays a game on TV. Which sells advertising. So that those coaches can get the big bucks.

CEOs are doing pretty good, too!

Comments

[Nini]

It's what the market can bear. And what it can bear depends on the values we put on certain items being sold in the market.

I very rarely watch sports, let alone pay to watch it; therefore I am not a contributor to the jacking up the price of sporting coaches.

[Peter]

It creates an awkward situation in that the coach is paid far more than his ostensible superiors (the athletic director, the university president, and ultimately the governor).