The Economics of Promotion and Relegation in Sports Leagues

Roger Noll

Journal of Sports Economics, 2002, vol. 3, issue 2, 169-203

Abstract: In most of the world’s professional sports leagues, the worst teams in better leagues are demoted while the best teams in weaker leagues are promoted. This article examines the economics of promotion and relegation, using data from English football (soccer). The crucial findings are as follows: players earn higher wages under promotion and relegation, promotion and relegation has a net positive effect on attendance, and the effect of promotion and relegation on competitive balance is ambiguous. The unbalancing effect arises because the system places some teams in leagues in which they have no realistic chance to afford a winning team, thereby causing teams to spend less on players during their (brief) stay in a higher league than they spent while trying to be promoted from as lesser league. The article concludes with an analysis of how promotion and relegation might be implemented in North America.

Date: 2002
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (60)

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/152700250200300205 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:jospec:v:3:y:2002:i:2:p:169-203

DOI: 10.1177/152700250200300205

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Journal of Sports Economics
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().