(to paraphrase Patrick Ewing, Wayne Rooney makes a lot of money, but he spends a lot, too)
It’s a fascinating comparison, given that Gordon Brown isn’t much of a defender, nor is particularly adept in the air. From the Mirror’s Ruki Sayid :
The Prime Minister should be paid about twice as much as Wayne Rooney, says a survey.
But that’s not such good news for Gordon Brown because people also say Rooney and other Premiership stars should get no more than £62,000 a year – which means the PM would actually have to take a hefty pay cut.
Pollsters questioned a cross-section of 3,000 people to find out what salaries they thought a variety of jobs were worth. They said footballers were the most overpaid. The average Premiership player picks up a whopping £676,000 and Manchester United’s Rooney earned £6million last year.
The PM’s £187,000 wage was also deemed too generous – and should be trimmed to about £135,000. Top authors such as JK Rowling, who picked up £25million last year, deserve around £80,000 instead. And leading businessmen should get £120,000 – a fraction of their average £736,000 salary.
The survey was carried out for Leftwing think-tank the Fabian Society by pollsters YouGov. A spokesman for the Fabian Society said: “It shows the public feels the gap between the richest and poorest workers should be narrower.”
No word on suggested salaries for tabloid editors and reports, but perhaps that can wait for a subsequent poll.
While the Rooney-deprived Manchester United claimed their first 3 points of the new season with a 1-0 home result over Spurs, former Best Player On Earth candidate (circa 1997) Ronaldo apparently has a medical excuse for his weight gain in recent years — even David Wells thinks Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva owes the striker an apology.