Government
An Unexpected Player in the Sports Subsidy Racket: ESPN
The broadcaster has been getting the kind of controversial tax breaks that normally go to the teams it covers.
Stories of professional sports teams extracting subsidies from local government are commonplace. They follow a familiar narrative: Team X threatens to leave town if it doesn't get a new stadium/a better tax break/a bigger pot of public money that it doesn't plausibly need. No bluff – or vague hint of "economic development" – is too outlandish. Invariably, politicians acquiesce because the only thing worse than making a painful public payment to a profitable sports team is having to watch that sports team walk away.
This refrain is so common that the most surprising municipal news on the sports front this year occurred when one mayor – Atlanta's Kasim Reed – actually said 'no.'