Wladimir Andreff (Ed.), Disequilibrium Sports Economics: Competitive Imbalance and Budget Constraints

Abstract

Abstract. The economics of professional team sport leagues has been built on three main pillars in the US literature: economic equilibrium for the product market and labour market for talent; profit maximisation; and competitive balance between teams (sporting equilibrium). The European literature has brought a fourth pillar: win maximisation with a hard budget constraint (break-even accounting rule). These four pillars have remained little questioned until recently. This emerging literature is one of the motivations for launching a book dealing with disequilibrium. Another is the editor’s conviction that the reality in team sport leagues does not fit with general equilibrium solutions. The first chapter introduces the previous elements and more generally the book while the seven following chapters develop a specific aspect related to disequilibrium: an attempt at modelling; a dynamic non-equilibrium simulation; the metrics of competitive imbalance; gender imbalance on the sports programme market; and the last three chapters on soft budget constraints with three different focuses (comparison between European and US leagues; governance and agency problem; regulation regarding the new UEFA club licensing and Financial Fair Play). As a whole, the book provides an original and realistic view that can and perhaps even must shape the future of sports economics. Keywords. Disequilibrium Sports Economics; Competitive Imbalance; Budget Constraints. JEL. Z20, L83, D50, L50, P20.