College Football Very Taxing | Neal McCluskey | Cato Institute: Commentary

College Football Very Taxing | Neal McCluskey | Cato Institute: Commentary: "many bowls receive generous taxpayer subsidies. According to Mark Yost, author of Varsity Green, seven bowls received more than $21.6 million in government aid between 2001 and 2005. And the majority of bowls are tax-exempt, supposedly because they're good for local tourism. That bowl executives often make big money and corporate sponsors get prominent advertising is apparently irrelevant.

Then, while playing in a bowl comes with a minimum payout of $750,000 for participating schools, many institutions end up spending much more than that to participate -- losses that taxpayers bear."

"legislators in New Jersey had sent millions of dollars in special grants to Rutgers for football-related capital improvements and stadium expenses. In Connecticut, state taxpayers bore the full, roughly $100 million burden for constructing UConn's Rentschler Field, which opened in 2003.

And this year, the University of Minnesota played its first season in its brand-new TCF Bank Stadium, for which state taxpayers are shelling out about $137 million."