To think it’s ridiculous that footballer Mohammed Salah is now earning £1m a week?

[KimberleyClark]

He earns an amount in a week that most ordinary people could live on for the rest of their lives!

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2023/sep/29/liverpool-mohamed-salah-earning-at-least-1m-a-week-adviser-ramy-abbas

I think Liverpool season tickets are astonishingly good value. DS’s junior season ticket is £165 per season.
Thats less that £10 per game.

Salah. Here he is.

I know trickle-down economics isn't widely loved as a concept on MN.

But many footballers pay a lot of tax (even after tax planning) and spend a considerable amount on expensive cars, watches, domestic help etc.

It’s not ridiculous at all. Salah is a global superstar. One of the very finest players of the world’s most popular sport. His extraordinary talent sells tickets, TV subscriptions, replica kits, merchandise etc etc all over the world. Superstar entertainers deserve to earn superstar salaries, whether their name is Taylor Swift, Tom Cruise or Mo Salah.
He wasn’t born into wealth or privilege, he comes from an ordinary family in a provincial town in Egypt and his talent and hard work has taken him from there to the Premier League. Living & working in the U.K., he will also be paying millions of pounds a year in direct & indirect taxes. I don’t begrudge him a penny.

I just wish footballers (and other ridiculously high earners) would do something useful with their cash like Victorian philanthropists instead of buying fast cars and using private jets.

If you earn £52 million a year, you could eg fund a football academy chain quite easily! Or pay for a scout hut to be rebuilt.

I know a lot of people do quietly fund things. I just wish more of them would.

And yes I know they pay lots of tax.

Trickle down is not a thing. Maybe the odd drop.

He does a lot

Of all the footballers who are paid ridiculous wages, I resent Salah the least. I know he gives away a fortune, particularly to the community he grew up in. He came from a very poor place in Egypt and worked hard to get where he is. He's a classy guy. It would be a shame if he left English football.

You mean ‘fast cars’ like Bentleys, McLarens, Aston Martins & Rolls-Royces, all built in British factories by skilled British craftspeople?

You mean ‘fast cars’ like Bentleys, McLarens, Aston Martins & Rolls-Royces, all built in British factories by skilled British craftspeople?

And sold by car dealerships and serviced by local garages.

I suspect estate agents and car salespeople in the likes of Prestbury and Chelsea earn a pretty decent living (and pay tax on their commission). Plus the VAT receipts on the expenditure of high net worth individuals/footballers.

People don't like to see people from poor or humble backgrounds doing well for themselves.

It's classism.

In terms of Salah, he's a very good footballer who gets results. I'm more irritated by the Jaden Sanchos and Mason Mounts who are utterly tragic, yet still rake it in.

I would assume that his salary is in line with the amount of revenue that he can create for his employer.

Didn't help him tonight though!

Lucky bugger

Breaking news!!! Footballer earns a lot of money. What an astute observation OP. You picked up on the event as soon as it happened, before anyone else saw it.

When the did Liverpool FC get taken into public ownership? That’s pretty big news, the we all missed. That clearly why OP thinks that her opinion should matter one jot.

Lucky Talented bugger.

Yet people are desperate to see e.g. Taylor Swift who is making that amount or more per night when she tours plus everything else attached to her name. Similarly other music acts. Salah is paid what people are prepared to pay. Some players in e.g. NFL are prob paid more.

I know a lot of his earning is not 'salary' but what he's paid by Liverpool is at least taxed as PAYE as players salaries have to be paid like any employee.

I mentioned JKR. I don’t begrudge her the amount she has earned. I only chose her because she is well liked on here. But I don’t see what criticism can be aimed at Salah but not her, regarding wealth.

If you’re a socialist and want to generally critique the staggering wealth inequality that exists under capitalism, fair enough.

Otherwise, it’s weird to single out footballers. They are, essentially, entertainers and probably do more good than harm in the world. I object far more to those who generate or preserve excessive wealth through means that damage and exploit the planet and communities.

And if you are going to single out footballers for whatever reason, focussing on one of the most philanthropic (in fact, one of the most philanthropic people, or any profession, in the country) is an odd choice.

Don’t know the current figures but Salah, as of last year, had given more than £40m to charity, as well as having ambassadorial roles.

It depends how you measure NFL contracts. The largest are around 50million USD per year, so on a 52 week basis they're not quite what Salah earns. On a game-by-game basis, NFL is 20-21 games maximum assuming you win the whole thing, so 2.5 - 3 million USD per game.

MLB contracts top out at 30-35million USD per year, so again, not what Salah earns, and those guys play 150+ games per year.

People are worth exactly what someone is willing to pay them. If my work offered me 1million per week to do my job I'm hardly going to turn it down on the basis that it's too much, or an obscene amount of money to be paid. Players in athletic sports careers are usually over by their mid-30's. I think they are perfectly justified in maximising their income for as long as they can.

Efacsen · Yesterday 13:02

MrsSkylerWhite · Yesterday 12:25

Christ Almighty. Humanity really does have its priorities all wrong.
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Since Salah has been playing for Liverpool research has shown a 20% drop in anti Muslim racist attacks in the city
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He is an extremely generous man in the UK and Egypt - in the top 8 philanthropists in the UK
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He's a UN Ambassador for diversity - mainly in education for women and girls
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Maybe save your sour comments

Sour?! Nonsense.

That’s all very good. Doesn’t make anyone worth ££1 million, though, does it?

@MrsSkylerWhite the market decides what he's worth.

If he was worth £25,000 per year, that's what he'd be paid.