Articles in this issue:

• Evaluating Inelastic Ticket Pricing Models

  Stacey L. Brook

   Economists have been perplexed by the overwhelming evidence that sports teams set ticket prices in the inelastic range of spectator demand. In response, a number of profit-maximizing explanations have been proposed in the literature explaining why sports teams set ticket prices in the inelastic range of spectator demand, yet an evaluation of the proposed theories is missing. Therefore, using National Football League team data covering the 1995 through the 1999 seasons is employed to: a) determine if NFL teams do set ticket prices in the inelastic range of spectator demand...Read more

• Financing Intercollegiate Athletics: The Role of Monitoring and Enforcing NCAA Recruiting Regulations

  Brad R. Humphreys

  Jane E. Ruseski

  Many economists view the NCAA as a cartel in the market for college athletes. Financially, this cartel allows NCAA members to attract and retain college athletes for the price of a ¡°grant-in-aid¡± without competitively bidding for the labor services of student-athletes, greatly reducing operating costs relative to a competitive market for athletes. A functioning cartel must have both monitoring of the members and an enforcement mechanism to punish violators. We investigate the factors that explain observed periods of probation in NCAA Division I-A football over the period 1978-2005. From...Read more

• Do Team-Specific Revenues Matter in Baseball’s Arbitration System?

  Phillip A. Miller

  According to baseball’s collective bargaining agreement, arbitrators may not consider team finances when rendering a decision. The author develops two theories to examine the setting of final offers. In the first theory, final offers are simply functions of the arbitral criteria and are, therefore, not a function of the revenue-generating capability of the team. In the second theory, the author argues that teams may trade some talented and, thus, high-priced arbitration ineligible players, resulting in an implicit premium embedded in the final offers. The empirical analysis suggests that...Read more

• The Novelty Effect of the New Football Stadia: The Case of Germany

  Arne Feddersen

  Wolfgang Maenning

  Malte Borcherding

  When decisions are made to construct new stadia or to undertake major renovation work, the decision makers often assume that more spectators will be attracted. This so-called “novelty effect?is used as an argument that an impulse towards increased demand for the region and its services will be created, thus justifying public sector management to supply public funding. This study registers the novelty effect of soccer stadia in Germany since the beginning of the Bundesliga (1963-64) up to the end of the 2003-04 season and is based on annual team attendance per game. The data from all 12,488...Read more