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Economist determines the financial value of fighting in the NHL. It pays to fight on ice. By as much as $18,135, to be precise.
That was the conclusion economist John Haisken-DeNew came to after analyzing the financial worth of duking it out in the NHL.
Not only are the hockey players who pummell each other getting paid more -- the winner's take far exceeds that of the loser.
"I thought for sure that hockey violence would be negative, that people would be punished. But it's not and so that's what allowed it to continue. It's a surprising result," said Haisken-DeNew.
As a self-confessed hockey fan, Haisken-DeNew was happy to finally find a way to marry his profession with his hobby. His research paper, titled "Blood Money: Incentives for Violence in the NHL," was presented Saturday at the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences at the University of B.C.
The economist's research found that a right or left winger is paid an average premium of $10,940 for every fight on ice -- slightly more than the average premium of $10,930 for making an assist.
Broken down further, Haisken-DeNew found the winner actually gets a "fight premium" of $18,135 compared to $11,993 for the loser.
Considering an NHL player gets into an average of two brawls a year, that means a winger whose good at fighting earns $36,270 more than he otherwise would for not fighting.
Haisken-DeNew used a complex formula he calls the "salary by linear regression with player fixed effects" to come to these numbers. Among the factors calculated in the formula include penalty minutes, points, games played and position.
Haisken-DeNew also found violence increases a team's chance of getting into the playoffs -- although it has minimal impact on their chances of winning the Stanley Cup.
The Ontario-native, who is currently based in Germany with the research institute RWI Essen, says he was motivated to find out why so many players are willing to risk serious injury.
"Over the years we've seen a lot of career-ending injuries and I thought, well clearly there must be some sort of incentive to stop this because we want to see the Wayne Gretzkys and Sidney Crosbys go on and play forever because we're all hockey fans. But why does this go on? So there must be some mechanism that goes on that allows this," he mused.
His findings fly in the face of many researchers who believe that hockey violence is just a spontaneous part of the game.
"It's certainly the most interesting research I've done," he said.
Haisken-DeNew suggested that one of way of preventing fights could be to introduce a fine.
A typical NHL team engages in 73 fights a year.
Hockey violence steadily rose between 1967 to 1987. The trend bucked between 1988 to 2005, with more public pressure to ease the brawls. But in 2005, there were still twice as any penalty minutes and twice as many fights as there were in 1967, said Haisken-DeNew.
lsin@png.canwest.com
Lena Sin, The Province
Published: Sunday, June 08, 2008
© The Vancouver Province 2008
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