Dartmouth Men's Basketball Team Votes to Unionize

pjmedia.com

The Dartmouth men’s basketball team voted 13-2 to form a union in a direct challenge to the antiquated NCAA amateur model.

College athletes are not amateurs. But are they professionals? This “in-between” status will become the source of controversy as the multi-billion-dollar business of college athletics fights it out with powerful unions who will represent the athletes.

Dartmouth basketball will be represented by the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), one of the most radical unions in the United States. SEIU has been aggressively unionizing industries that are traditionally non-union in healthcare and public service. Tapping into amateur athletics is the motherlode.

The National Labor Relations Board cleared a path for unionizing college athletics by stretching the definition of “employees” almost beyond recognition. Late last year, the NLRB issued a rule that radically altered “the franchisor-franchisee relationship, potentially shaking the foundation of a key system that contributes to the U.S. economy.”

Imagine the opportunity for strikes and other work actions during the NCAA tournaments.

Wall Street Journal:

The election was ordered by the NLRB’s regional director, Laura Sacks, who had concluded that the players are employees “because Dartmouth has the right to control the work performed by the Dartmouth men’s basketball team, and the players perform that work in exchange for compensation.” That decision followed a memo from the NLRB’s general counsel in September 2021 setting out her position that college players are employees under the National Labor Relations Act.

Dartmouth immediately filed a request for Sacks’s decision to be reviewed.

College athletes may not be amateurs but pit the NCAA Division I champion against the worst NBA team and watch the slaughter. The kids wouldn’t have a chance…