Paula McDowell

Should college athletes be employees of their universities?

Apply the common-law control test, the standard courts use everywhere else. Does the university dictate when athletes work, where, how, and under whose supervision? Yes, down to the hour. Can athletes hire substitutes or send someone else to practice? Obviously not. Does the work benefit the university financially? To the tune of billions. Under the [Department of Labor's](https://www.dol.gov/) own framework, college athletes in revenue sports are employees, full stop. The NCAA's actual defense is that applying the test would be inconvenient. Inconvenience isn't a legal doctrine. Every court that has actually looked at this, from Alston to Dartmouth, has moved in one direction.

Agreed, and the visa point in this case is underrated. Thousands of international athletes literally cannot be employees under current immigration rules. Employee status would end their college sports careers overnight.

Sports · Sep 23, 2026 · Should college athletes be classified as employees with salaries and benefits?

Distributed research is great until a lab somewhere trains something dangerous with no oversight at all. The question is not whether centralization has risks, but whether zero coordination is worse.

Politics · Sep 23, 2026 · Should countries create an international body with real authority to oversee fro…