Some professional sports teams are competing as hard off the field as on. They are seeking hundreds of millions of dollars in public funds for new stadiums and ballparks. How much does it cost to build a home for the "home team," and who should foot the bill?

They're celebrating in Green Bay, Wisconsin, and not because the famous home team is winning football games. In fact, the Green Bay Packers have a mediocre 7-7 record this season. What has the football fans excited is last month's vote to rebuild the Packers' venerable Lambeau Field, at a cost of over $200 million. More than half that amount will come from a new 5% local sales tax in effect for up to 30 years.

The Packers are only the latest in a long line of professional sports franchises to seek public aid for more modern facilities. The Boston Red Sox missed baseball's playoffs this year, but their owners scored a victory on a different playing field. The city of Boston and the state of Massachusetts agreed to contribute more than $300 million towards the $665 million price tag of building a new Fenway Park.

Professional sports has become a big business in this country. Star players command multimillion dollar salaries. The National Football League, the National Basketball Association, and Major League Baseball all benefit from billion dollar broadcast deals. New stadiums costing hundreds of millions of dollars fit squarely into that landscape.

Teams insist that more modern and attractive home fields will generate the money they need to stay competitive. Owners even have moved—or threatened to move—their teams to different cities just because a new stadium beckons.

How much would you pay to keep your favorite team at home?

• Using the 5% sales tax plan approved in Green Bay, how much would you be contributing to the rebuilding of the stadium if you purchased $1,500 of taxable merchandise in a single year?

• If your annual purchases averaged $1,500 over 30 years, what total amount would you be contributing during that time?

That crunching noise you hear coming from your local stadium may not be the result of a goal-line stand. More likely, it's the sound of accountants crunching the numbers to make a new stadium deal work.

Their job has become more difficult in recent years, as cities and states have become reluctant to finance stadium projects. Both the Green Bay Packers and the Boston Red Sox are using a combination of their own private funding and public money.

• What's the difference in the amount of public funds that the Packers and the Red Sox will be using?

• What percentage of the total cost of their stadiums is each team paying?

• In making their appeal for public funding, the Red Sox said that their own $352 million investment would break the record just set by the San Francisco Giants. The Giants invested $320 million in their new ballpark. By what percentage does the Red Sox investment exceed that of the Giants?

• Do you think the public should help pay for local football stadiums? Why or why not?

Teams with new stadiums say that the cities that help build them benefit greatly. The large construction project creates thousands of jobs. The millions of fans flocking to the new fields spend money at local restaurants, stores, and parking garages.

A new stadium can also attract tourists and help turn a city into a convention center. The Cleveland Indians' Jacobs Field, built largely with public money during the 1990s, is credited for revitalizing Cleveland's depressed downtown area.

Not everyone agrees with the promises of new stadiums. Consumer advocate and Green Party presidential candidate Ralph Nader opposes public support. In a recent Boston.com article entitled, "Stadium subsidies scalp the public," Nader opposed public funding for a new Red Sox ballpark. "No government has ever recovered the investment in a baseball stadium, let alone seen any returns on that investment," Nader warned.

"These boondoggles are promoted as making things better for fans. Real fans will end up being second-class citizens as ticket prices increase and affordable seats are placed farther away from the field as luxury boxes become a priority."

In Green Bay, meanwhile, voters turned down a companion proposal to use any excess funds from the new sales tax to pay for other programs such as libraries, museums, and human services.

Learn More

• Practice calculating sales tax in the Destination MATH activity MSC IV: Finding Percents of a Whole.

More Links

• Find out more about the attempts of the Green Bay Packers and the Boston Red Sox to get public funding for stadiums.

• Read "Stadium subsidies scalp the public," by consumer advocate Ralph Nader.

Related Resources

• Read about one of the most recently completed sports stadiums in Corner to Copa: The Last Game at Tiger Stadium and the First at Comerica Park.
  
  
• Get an alternative view in Field of Schemes : How the Great Stadium Swindle Turns Public Money into Private Profit.