It's been established in the economic literature that physical attractiveness and pay are positively correlated. That is, controlling for other factors that are correlated to pay, people who are easy on the eyes tend to get paid more. How does this work in sports? Sports economist Dave Berri (this is from a year-old article, but I just came across it):
In football, prettiness shouldn’t matter — just ask Johnny Unitas. Players are evaluated solely on their ability to contribute to wins, right? Not entirely. The economists Rob Simmons, Jennifer VanGilder and I collected data on 121 N.F.L. quarterbacks who played from 1995 to 2006. We looked at the factors that determine player pay — career statistics, experience, Pro Bowl appearances and draft position — as well as the symmetry of each quarterback’s face. Sure enough, symmetry had a positive impact on a quarterback’s salary. Specifically, an increase of one standard deviation in facial symmetry led to a nearly 8 percent increase in pay.
To put this result in perspective, we found that a “good-looking” quarterback like Kerry Collins or Charlie Frye earned approximately $300,000 more per year than his stats and other pay factors would predict. Meanwhile, quarterbacks like Jeff George and Neil O’Donnell, who, sadly, were not found to have very symmetrical faces, suffered an equivalent penalty.
But it’s not the Brett Favres — the guys often referred to as “the face of the franchise” — who receive the greatest return on their handsome faces. It’s the QBs clinging to the bottom of the roster who get the biggest pay bump from good looks.
It seems that Simmons, VanGilder, and Berri are saying that when it comes to picking, say, 3rd-string QB's, coaches solve an information problem - who will be the best QB available with "best" referring to future performance - by observing facial symmetry. Why? A few couple of points.
- Facial symmetry is associated with better performance.
- There is relatively little information about how potential 3rd stringers perform, leaving the decision to be based upon other observable characteristics.
An obvious extension of this research is to use it to examine other positions on the football field. For instance, are left tackles paid more because of their facial symmetry? How about linebackers?
They expanded the last NFL draft and found no association between draft position and facial symmetry.
Another extension is to extend it to other sports. In college, you can't use the pay of college QB's or any other player for that matter because they don't get paid. But you could use the pay of college coaches. Are they paid a premium for their looks?