Who is the highest paid rider in the peloton?

[McLovin]

If we speak about biggest salary/finished raced in the last 3 years it must be Andy. He's like Arnold in Terminator 2. Arnold said "Hasta la vista baby" for almost 100k dollars. 100k dollars. Almost as much as Andy pedaling a couple of km in Rund um den Henninger Turm.

 

[Dazed and Confused]

If we speak about biggest salary/finished raced in the last 3 years it must be Andy. He's like Arnold in Terminator 2. Arnold said "Hasta la vista baby" for almost 100k dollars. 100k dollars. Almost as much as Andy pedaling a couple of km in Rund um den Henninger Turm.

100K dollars are peanuts in Hollywood.
Must be much more.

 

[McLovin]

100K dollars are peanuts in Hollywood.
Must be much more.

You misunderstood. He took that money for those words only (15.000.000 for 700 words).

 

[SeriousSam]

Exactly. But doesn't mean they are intrinsically worth more which was my point in the first place.

Are they intrinsically worth more than a burger flipper at McDonalds? Wages are largely determined by supply and demand, which on its face has nothing to do with intrinsic worth or what compensation someone deserves.

I don't subscribe to the view that what the market pays someone is also the amount of money that person deserves, but it's important to keep distinct a theory of worth (what someone ought to get, or deserves) and how wages are empirically determined.

It seems when you say that what cyclists are paid in comparison to footballer is pathetic, you're saying they deserve more. But then you have to ask yourself why they deserve such huge amounts at all, compared to say a burger flipper. On the other hand, if you are asking why footballers are getting more, it's easy to answer. The sport generates more revenues.

 

[Dazed and Confused]

You misunderstood. He took that money for those words only (15.000.000 for 700 words).

right, still too early for me.

Yep, nice pay.

 

[yespatterns]

Are they intrinsically worth more than a burger flipper at McDonalds? Wages are largely determined by supply and demand, which on its face has nothing to do with intrinsic worth or what compensation someone deserves.

I don't subscribe to the view that what the market pays someone is also the amount of money that person deserves, but it's important to keep distinct a theory of worth (what someone ought to get, or deserves) and how wages are empirically determined.

It seems when you say that what cyclists are paid in comparison to footballer is pathetic, you're saying they deserve more. But then you have to ask yourself why they deserve such huge amounts at all, compared to say a burger flipper. On the other hand, if you are asking why footballers are getting more, it's easy to answer. The sport generates more revenues.

I agree. Sadly a lot of people get paid more than their intrinsic worth. If you are curious about comparisons, bonuses and commercial pay has to be included. My opinion it's most all of them are paid too much, but that's probably just jealousy on my part.

 

[Fight.The.Power]

Average salary in the Dutch League is ~€250,000-300,000 a year. In fact, you will be hard pressed to find a football player that earns more than a million a year. I'm not exactly sure about the situation this year with Belkin and all, but Rabobank is still paying a lot of the wages, so I suspect many of the salaries of Belkin are still on Rabobank levels. In that case, Gesink might earn more (close to, or by now fully €1 million) than any football player in the Netherlands (there might be some exceptions, but I can't think of any). I don't think he earns more than speed skater Sven Kramer though.

Mollema, Gesink, Boom, Terpstra, Kelderman (rumors are that he rejected a Sky offer because his current wage is higher than what Sky was willing to offer him for next year) and probably a few others all earn more than the average wage in the Dutch Pro League

Whoooaaa . . . . . So you are taking the average of the top 500 football players in Holland and comparing it to the top 5 Dutch cyclists ???

How on earth can you seriously make that comparison ??

 

[karlboss]

I agree. Sadly a lot of people get paid more than their intrinsic worth. If you are curious about comparisons, bonuses and commercial pay has to be included. My opinion it's most all of them are paid too much, but that's probably just jealousy on my part.

I'm not a fan of these arguments. If you generate the income you are paid a share of it. All cyclists may train just as hard, but the fact is winners are paid more as they can do something the other can't. I'd rarely say a sportsman is paid too much. When they might be you weigh it against other sportsmen in the same field i.e., Wiggins 2.5 million vs Contador at 2.8 million I'll take Contador.
The inherited billionaires club is the most overpaid, by far. They've done nothing to earn it, and they pay someone else to think for them and move money around. It's like walking into a poker tournament with one million times what anyone else starts with, of course you'll win.
So far as underpaid, and overpaid for that matter, look to any government regulated industry, in terms of underpaid health and education and you can see it by just how much more private teachers and doctors are paid, and for overpaid, inefficient managers, I know of some who have none to manage, and still take home 6 figures. Surely you'd lay that person of and have another person at the coalface.
For cycling, I think the balance is out, i think the winners are paid too much in relation to the workers, not for the current system but i think the current system is a little broken. If we think about football, the strikers are paid the most, and defenders the least, but the strikers on average are paid double what the defenders are. If we look at basketball vs a TDF team, That's the starting 5 vs the starting 9. The lowest paid rider on a big team might be on 1-2 hundred thousand, where as the star around 3 million. Let's be generous and say 200 000 and generous again and say the leader is on 2000000 that's 10 times, but in the NBA that number is likely to be around the 3 or 4 or in extreme examples 5 mark. The system i talk of is one which encourages conservative riding and winning MTFs and TTs to lock up a tour, if breaks and audacious attacks started winning the key riders to make that happen would be worth more.