I've not commented on the new economic changes yet, as I was happy to accept the view of the BBs that it was necessary, and wanted to see exactly how it affected my team before shouting. Now we've had a week under the new regime it would be useful I think to compare the impact on different teams to judge whether it has worked as intended in terms of game balance.
I understood from the announcement that the intention was to restrict the teams making huge profits each week and thus pushing up inflation. I'm pretty certain that isn't me. Before the changes I was making perhaps 50k or so profit each week and that money, plus TV money was going in to small stadium expansions and buying moderately good players (my record signing to date is $795,000). I'm a struggling division 1 team in England - finished sixth in both my seasons in that division but won my relegation playoff each time. My draft players haven't been good enough to keep or sell for anything impressive, so I rely on a small profit each week to have any hope of one day buying a player or two who can help me compete with the top teams in my league who have stadiums two or three times bigger than me, and several big stars.
This week, my stadium was full (very nearly, 4 luxury boxes not filled) and the gross receipts were $228,700. Losing $91,480 to the new players' union left me with just $137,220 - and my net profit for the week is $23,000 or so. In other words, it will take me twice as long now to save the money I need for the players who are essential to my survival in the top division.
My questions:
How are the top teams figures comparing to that? Are the top teams suffering even more than a 50% drop in profits? If not, then the changes won't help balance the league, but I appreciate this wasn't the primary intention.
Where is the TV money, which I thought would be a weekly addition but does not appear in this week's economy?
Do the changes make investing in players now much more of a financial incentive than investing in stadium expansion, since ticket sales are taxed so heavily? If so, won't this weaken the anti-inflationary effect of the changes?
Nick