Eight years ago, the owners of the Minnesota Vikings, Zygy and Mark Wilf, paid about 21 percent of the cost of the new Vikings’ stadium. At the time, an obscure socialist blogger described what we knew about the sweetheart cost-sharing arrangement:
Vikings PR people like to tell Minnesotans that the team’s owner, billionaire Zygi Wilf, is paying about 60 percent of the ever-growing $1.2 billion stadium cost.
The truth, as Star Tribune/1500ESPN columnist Patrick Reusse pointed out back in May 2012, is that something like $450 million of the Wilf’s share will be paid by people other than the Wilfs. For instance, season ticket holders will be making exorbitant seat license payments to the Wilfs, the National Football League will be paying a subsidized “loan” to the Wilfs, and U.S. Bank will be making naming rights payments to the Wilfs. All of this will offset the Wilf’s stadium costs by about $450 million
Taking all of that into consideration, Mr. Wilf looks to be shelling out more in the neighborhood of $250 million of his own money, or 21% of the cost of the $1.2 billion total, not the 60 percent the Vikings claim.
It’s difficult for an outsider to come up with precise numbers, but that seems like a pretty fair, pardon the pun, ballpark estimate.
Taxpayers often subsidize infrastructure — roads, bridges, ports, rural broadband, community centers, etc. — that private companies can’t or won’t build on their own. That makes good sense.
But should an NFL stadium be considered one of those things? Did the Wilfs really have so little to gain financially from a new stadium that they needed massive taxpayer subsidies?
(Photo credit: Star Tribune)
Every year, we’re learning a bit more about just how much the Wilfs gained from this new stadium. In 2005, the Wilfs paid about $600 million for the Vikings. The last time Forbes did its estimates, the Vikings were thought to be worth $3.93 billion.
To be sure, not all of this gain in team value is due to the stadium. But the stadium is certainly a substantial driver of increased valuation, and it’s never been more clear that NFL owners have more than enough financial wherewithal to fund their own revenue-generating assets.
By the way, the Wilfs’ money-making machine is just getting warmed up. Last weekend, St. Paul Pioneer Press sports Columnist Charlie Walters speculated that this year Forbes will say the Vikings are valued at around $4.5 billion, which is about 7.5 times more than what the Wilfs originally paid.
Meanwhile, the Minnesota Legislature is struggling to come up with ways to fund basic life necessities for struggling low-income families, such as housing, nutrition, medical leave, child care, mental health care, health care, nursing home care, roads, and bridges.
So, yeah, I haven’t really gotten over it yet.
Are Minnesota Vikings season ticket holders effectively government-dependent welfare queens? After all, a state legislator’s analysis finds that every Vikings ticket benefits from a taxpayer subsidy of over $72.
Critics may quibble with the specifics of the Marty analysis. But specifics aside, the undeniable fact remains that Minnesota taxpayers are on the hook for an enormous subsidy that looks to be much larger than the $498 million figure typically quoted during legislative debates.