Why is there no union for college coaches?

Let the NCAA and college administrators tremble at a coaches union. The coaching staff have nothing to lose but their chains. They have NCAA Nationals to win. Coaches of the world, unite!

They're happy clinging on for table scraps.

College coaching, like working in TV, magazines, movies, pro sports, etc. has more supply of labor than demand for said labor, driving prices (i.e., your wages) down.

Universities are big business. Take a school like UVA. Their annual operating budget is about $1.5B. The irony of universities is that they're run by liberals, but are one of the most exploitative businesses in the world, taking advantage of athletes, grad students and non-tenured professors, among others.

Universities are finally seeing technology and competition that's real. Over the next few decades, they're going to have to adapt to online learning and the price pressures inherent in it, or die.

With that gloomy backdrop, the only path to a higher salary that I see is to generate more revenue for your business. But don't expect job security if you do. Look at college basketball and football coaches if you doubt me.

Bottom line: don't go into coaching for $. It's a labor of love.

Because Nick Saban doesn't need that p**$y sh*t.

Universities are not run by liberals. They're run by business men with a figurehead who is usually liberal. You're right about them exploiting athletes, head students and workers.

Anyone care to restart this dialog? I’ve been a D2 coach for going on 7 years now, four years full time, and still don’t even make minimum wage. I’m smart enough to have a part time job that pays the bills but not smart enough to quit coaching. I thought something might happen with the proposed legislation this past year but it failed and even if it hadn’t they would have just labeled coaches as “exempt”. We had a athletic department meeting where they told us that was their plan if it went through. Can anyone give me some light at the end of the tunnel?

It’s a shame this can’t get traction.

Been working at a state school for 7 years now and we’re ALL required to be members of the teachers union. We can choose to pay dues and essentially get “extra protection” if something goes wrong, or not pay dues and get the “basic package.” Probably bad terms to use, but that’s how I’ve always looked at it. They do pay for us to go to convention every year and every few years when the collective bargaining runs out, they’re very helpful, but for the most part it’s not for the coaches. Couldn’t really imagine how a coaches union would work though. You have some coaches working one season and having one true recruiting season and then you have a distance coach working basically 5-7 days a week for 9 months out of the year, plus recruiting over the summer. That might cause some serious negotiation issues every few years.

"Why is there no union for college coaches?" I agree with somebody's comment above: It's a buyers' market. Lots of people want to coach college, there's a limited number of positions, and there will always be someone who's willing to work cheap(er).

I mean, I was a volunteer for nine years--and the next three years I grossed a total of $4750. Was happy to have the opportunities. There'll always be somebody like that.

Suprised no one has posted the actual answer yet... Under federal law, managerial employees (i.e. coaches) cannot unionize.

The Federal law is the NLRA which governs unionization for the vast majority of private sector workers, and specifically excludes managers and coaches have been found to be managers. This is why there are professional players unions, umpires/refs unions, but no coaches union.

This only applies to private colleges, state employees ability to unionize is a matter of state law. States have all different rules on what government workers can unionize and what government workers cannot.

In some states there could be a coaches union. And I'm sure in some states many coaches belong to some kind of college faculty/staff union.

I still think the all powerful NCAA could at least sets a minimum staffing compensation or something like that to be considered an NCAA program. Wishful thinking I know.

I would like to know why as coaches we do not have a union to protect us in this harsh industry where we are underpaid under appreciated and at any time could have our jobs taken from us for no cause or if a cause is needed it can be fabricated without any specific details specified which can derail a coaches career. What can coaches do to band together?