Much of the world is mourning the tragic losses endured by millions of Haitians these past weeks. But last Sunday, millions of Americans set aside their concern for several hours to cheer their favorites in the NFC and AFC championships (I was among them).
If you felt a little guilty, here’s something to soothe your conscience: According to the Minneapolis Star Tribune, the NFL is donating to World Vision’s Haiti relief efforts about $2 million of merchandise bearing the names of the losing teams.
Please understand, World Vision is a great organization that does amazing work in the U.S. and around the world. I support their work philosophically and financially. I give them kudos for helping to turn this negative into a positive.
But, really! Can you picture thousands of Haitians running around next month with shirts and caps declaring the 2010 championship status of the New York Jets and the Minnesota Vikings? It is difficult to think of a more striking image of the disparity between Americans’ values and priorities and the world’s condition.
Let’s do the math.
First, the football games:
- The one-year-old, $720 million Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis holds 63,000, while the Louisiana Superdome holds 69,000 (except during a hurricane, when its capacity drops to 30,000). That’s a total of 132,000 seats.
- At a conservative estimate, ticket prices averaged $250 (the low end of the secondary market), so fans spent at least $33 million just to get in the door.
- Add to that parking, concessions, souvenirs, etc., and the event easily cost spectators $50 million.
- But wait, many traveled from their home town to be there. Let’s say one-fourth of the spectators spent $2,500 in travel expenses: Another $82.5 million.
Grand Total for Those Attending the Games: $132.5 million.
Now let’s look at Haiti (pre-earthquake):
- Roughly 9 million people; 80% live in poverty, 54% in abject poverty.
- Two-thirds of Haitians depend on agriculture, severely set back in 2008 by four major tropical storms;
- Haiti’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP): $11.6 billion annually
- That is $32 million per day – for the nation;
- Per Capita, that’s $35/day (about $1,300/year);
Hmmmmm. Looks like 132,000 Americans (1.5% of Haiti’s population), for a four-hour event, spent more than the entire country of Haiti produced in four days – before the earthquake.
And we will do it all again this Sunday– and next — only bigger and better.
Don’t get me wrong — I like football — and I think it’s great that those shirts and caps will be given to people instead of thrown in a landfill. But $2 million of discarded clothes from our Sunday sports worship services are just crumbs from our table. Imagine what would happen if we invited our Haitian neighbors to join us at the table; or at least saved them a seat in front of the plasma TV.
What do you think?1. Should we be concerned about the economic disparity between the U.S. and other countries, such as Haiti?
2. How can we share more than our scraps with the rest of the world?
By the way, I learned that the NY Jets have a fan club called “Gang Green.” Ironic. Sad.
Jeffrey Lundberg is founder and President of ENTERCHANGE, a fresh voice among leadership and organizational consulting firms. ENTERCHANGE builds healthy, collaborative organizations with visionary leaders. Learn more at www.ENTERCHANGE.us
Haiti facts source: https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/ha.html
No comments:
Post a Comment