Olympic executives cash in on a ‘Movement’ that keeps athletes poor
The Olympics are truly not about money for the athletes.
And indeed, they cannot be.<p>Only a select few have any leverage at all to bargain for more money (think Husain Bolt and others at his level).
But these select few are already profiting big-time from the Olympics via endorsements, etc.
So the last thing they want is to put the games at risk.<p>The rest of the athletes are there because they love the competition.
And there&#x27;s nothing wrong with that!
It&#x27;s truly a win-win that hundreds of athletes are living out their dreams by competing for a gold medal in canoeing or archery or what-have-you, and that somebody will even be watching them do it.<p>Stepping back a bit, there&#x27;s no reason that anybody should be getting a salary simply because they are one of the very best at their chosen sport.
Sports stars command large salaries to the extent that they <i>have dedicated fans</i>.
If you compete in a fringe sport, you&#x27;re not going to have many dedicated fans.<p>(This is why every top-tier athlete makes more from product endorsements than from their team salary.)<p>((This is also why NBA players earn by far the highest salaries among U.S. athletes - basketball allows for much more player&#x2F;fan connection than any other major sport.))