How socioeconomic status affects competitive sports participation across regions

Is It a Level Playing Field? How Socioeconomic Status Affects the Extent to Which Someone Participates in a Sport Competitively
Introduction
The question of to what extent socioeconomic status affects how long someone participates in a sport competitively is really a relative one. Status is a descriptor that makes sense only within the parameters of context. Status in the U.S. for example can be defined against a varied tier—low socioeconomic status, middle class socioeconomic status, upper class socioeconomic status. But in a Latin American countries, low socioeconomic status is more the norm than not—and in these countries, competitive sport is not just a way of life, it is one of the few opportunities anybody in these lands has of making it out and engaging in upward mobility by signing a major league or professional contract with a pro sports club in the U.S. Socioeconomic status, therefore, is a concept that has to be evaluated within the context of region and background. Low socioeconomic status in the U.S. may have a different impact on one’s participation in competitive sport when compared to low socioeconomic status in a Latin American country, where many pro scouts go to assess the local talent. This paper will answer the question “How does socioeconomic status affect how long someone participates in a sport competitively?” by examining the variable with the contexts of ethnicity, culture, and nationality.
Socioeconomic Status as a Factor
What is one’s socioeconomic status (SES)? Simply speaking it refers to the economic and financial circumstances of one’s family and one’s community. Individuals who are of a high socioeconomic status are more affluent: their families live in wealthy neighborhoods, own property, and can afford to pay for private schooling or the best colleges in the nation. Those who come from backgrounds of low socioeconomic status do not have access to the same opportunities as people from the upper class. They cannot get into the best schools, usually because of where they live; they thus miss out on having the best training; and therefore they cannot develop their skills to the same extent that someone with access can. Simply put, the access gap is a reality (Pribesh, Gavigan & Dickinson, 2011). It is widest between low SES and high SES communities—and access to sports is more easily obtained in high SES communities (Dubrow & Adams, 2012). That is why SES is considered such an important factor in determining who plays competitive sports and for how long.
Buckingham, Wheldall and Beaman-Wheldall (2013) report that children who come from low SES backgrounds are less likely than children from high SES backgrounds to be part of environments where opportunities to develop skills can be obtained. In other words, low SES children tend to lack access to the places where skills—whether academic or athletic—can be developed with assistance from professionals. Professional teachers or trainers require payment and those who are good will seek top jobs at schools or within organizations that can afford to pay them a high salary (Orr, 2003). Such schools and organizations are going to be in higher SES communities because they are the ones that will fund them—at least that is how it tends to be in America.
This means that low SES families, many of whom are minorities—such as African American or Hispanic American—are excluded from the opportunities to take part in athletic development and training, competition and growth that upper income families can provide for their children. There is a reason why many pro athletes come from upper class families. It is easier for them to get into the best schools where all the focus can be on competitive sports development.
The Myth about Sports—and the Reality
The myth about pro athletes is that they tend to come from humble beginnings to become legends. There is the LeBron James story—the young kid from Akron who grew up without a father and lived in the worst apartments in a dead-end town growing up. There is Clint Dempsey who grew up in a trailer park and learned to play soccer with immigrants across the Texas-Mexico border. There is the Michael Oher story, which was turned into a film—The Blind Side—the story of the pro football player who was homeless as a teen until being taken in by a kind family. These stories make it seem like SES does not matter—that anyone who believes in a sport and wants to play it can play it and can play it long term and even make a career out of it. However, as Dubrow and Adams (2012) show most professional sports players—at least in leagues like the NBA—“come from relatively advantaged social origins and African Americans from disadvantaged social origins have lower odds of being in the NBA than African American and white players from relatively advantaged origins” (p. 190). In other words, the myth of a level playing field is propagated by stories like those of LeBron James, Clint Dempsey, and Michael Oher—but the reality is that these are not the common stories told, not by a long shot.
The reality is that to play sports long-term requires investment. It requires capital—and not just financial capital; it also requires human capital. While human capital can be obtained without investment, it depends upon the good will and charity of the individual to be part of a young person’s life, to guide that person and shape that person’s experience with sport. Barring these few occurrences, the young person will need money to pay for equipment, lessons, fees, travel, tuition (if going to a good school with a good competitive sports program), and coaches. All of these costs can add up and far exceed the amount of money that low SES families have to spend on sports for their children.
The popular media myths about sports and low SES families are that children from poor communities grind it out all day every day at the local gym or at the local basketball court, playing anyone and everyone who comes along. This is the story that is told because it is romantic and based in fantasy. It allows the viewer to field good about his own long-shot chances of playing sports competitively for very long. The reality is quite different, as Spaiij, Farquharson and Marjoribanks (2015) point out: the reality is that athletes from low SES backgrounds are underrepresented in the professional sports world. The reality is that the so-called level playing field is not really all that level: the majority of players come from upper SES backgrounds.
Neighborhoods in Low SES Communities
The idea that the child from a low SES community does not need access the high-end gym and does not need the trainers and coaches, that simply going out every day to the local courts will give him the commitment, dedication, love and drive he needs to play competitively throughout his life is another unrealistic claim. Most children of low SES communities do not go out and play at the local playgrounds for one very simple reason: they do not feel safe. Low SES communities tend to suffer from crime, drugs, violence, gangs, and prostitution. They are not neighborhoods where kids can be free to be kids. As “compared with higher socioeconomic groups, participants from lower socioeconomic groups were more likely to report that their neighborhood was unsafe, unattractive, and had insufficient places for physical activity” (Kamphus et al., 2008, p. 79). A child from a low SES background may start out playing competitively in a league in a safe community, but when the league is over for the season, the competitive play stops—as there are no more nearby alternatives. The child from the high SES community is not faced with the same problem. That child can compete year round because there are no threats to safety and security. The child is able play without financial worries or external threats like robbery, violence, or drugs getting in the way of the child’s access to competition.
Other Cultures
While that is the situation in American culture, the situation is actually a bit different in other cultures—especially in cultures that are still economically developing, like Latin American nations, where many of today’s professional baseball players come from. The reason so many pro ball players are taken from Latin America today is simple: for those youths there, playing ball is a way of life and SES is not a major factor in terms of granting access to playing. Everyone is playing—and playing hard—because everyone accepts that this is a way of life. There are no obstacles based on class or background as everyone in Latin American nations like the Dominican Republic, Cuba or Venezuela (Rice et al., 2017). As Arbena (2000) points out, these communities and cultures find joy simply in playing and in competing: their culture has ground up around sports like baseball and soccer (football). They compete because it is fun for them and not necessarily a way out or a way of upward mobility should they be called on to go pro. It is simply part of their culture.
In a society that has made competitive sport a way of life, it is not hard to see the difference between it and the problems in America where SES plays a more pivotal factor in determining who can play for a longer period of time and who is denied access to playing sport competitively for long. In the U.S., the society is more complex and much less simplistic like it is in developing countries like those in Latin America. In the U.S., many children may be from low SES backgrounds but they will still have the TVs, the video games, and toys to play with inside so as to keep them busy since they cannot go outside to play in unsafe neighborhoods. For example, a family living in Chicago where record murder rates are occurring year over year, is not going to send the children out to the local park to play sport every day—the fear of danger will be too high.
In America, seasonality is another issue. In most parts of the U.S., the seasons change and there is a spring, summer, winter and fall—which can impact when a child can play sport outdoors. There may be winter leagues with indoor arenas—but the child will have to live in a decent or upper SES community in order to be able to afford it or have access to it. Otherwise, the child is not going to have an opportunity to play in such a league, and thus will not have an opportunity to play competitively year round like one from a higher SES will have.
In a Latin American country, on the other hand, the seasons may barely change. It will be like summer year round. The games are ongoing no matter what time of year, and the people are active supporters of the games. Since everyone is of the same background there are no barriers to competitive sport. Communities set aside areas for sport in these nations and they are largely respected by the people there as important to their culture and way of life (Rice et al., 2017).
The Level Playing Field
The level playing field is a concept often used when discussing sports, because it refers to the idea that anyone from any walk of life can pick up a glove, pick up a bat, catch a ball, or throw—that anyone from any SES background can participate in sports and play competitively as long as one likes because what defines one on the field is how one performs and not where one comes from. However, the problem with this idea is that it is outmoded. The level playing field likely existed at one time, when sports was far less specialized. But today there are fields of study entirely dedicated to sports—sports medicine, sports psychology, sports health, sports training, sports entertainment, and so on. Anyone interested in sports may find that the playing field is no longer so level. It is now tiered—at least in America—just as the social classes are tiered. Those who are of the higher class have more advantage and greater access to better fields where better trainers, schools and opportunities await. Those who are of a lower SES find a less even field, where there are fewer trainers and fewer opportunities to compete safely or to develop one’s technique.
The access to competitive sports is thus limited to those who come from a low SES. They may be able to play for a while—but eventually the problem of finance and funding becomes a reality that has to be addressed. The problem of safety and security can appear at any moment. Communities that suffer from low SES are less likely to offer safe parks, safe playgrounds, or even leagues where kids can get together to compete for much of the year.