One in every 6 NFL players will declare bankruptcy within 12 years of retirement
We have heard it many times before that the NFL, is hard to keep a job in and many of the veteran players in the league end up bankrupt. Well according to a new study, 1 in every 6 players of NFL players will declare for bankruptcy within 12 years of retirement.
According to a new research paper by the National Bureau of Economic Research, about 1 in 6 (15.7 percent) NFL players will declare for bankruptcy within 12 years of retirement.
Researchers collected data on around 2,000 NFL players drafted from 1996-2003, and looked at earnings data and court records. Players weren’t more or less likely to file for bankruptcy based on career length or total earnings. No matter what they made or for how long they played for, within two years of retirement, filings gradually increased, “likely due to a combination of players rapidly drawing down limited savings and having leveraged investments.”
“Players with median-length careers earn about $3.2 million in a few years. If they are forward-looking and patient, they should save a large fraction of their income to provide for when they retire from the NFL,” wrote the paper’s authors, Kyle Carlson, Joshua Kim, Annamaria Lusardi and Colin F. Camerer.
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