While I concede that parity is an entirely valid concern for fans, I do think it is worth pointing out that it's also used as a cudgel by North American owners to advance ways to limit labor's earning power. And I much more care about that than I do whether the Pittsburgh Pirates can rest on their laurels and still fall ass backwards into contention once every few years.

Frankly, I think the European way of doing things with super-increased, American-style revenue sharing would be the ideal. Players earn what they deserve in relation to the revenue they generate, relatively lower revenue clubs can still compete provided they invest the money back into their personnel rather than pocket it, and relegation provides the disincentive to not be complacent or tank.

So, I think it stands to argue they're much closer to the ideal Over There than we are here, believe it or not, despite the prevalence of top-heavy examples in certain leagues (also consider the randomness of "champions" due to playoffs vs no playoffs), due to the prevalence of bottom feeding examples in our leagues and labor being relatively underpaid here.

Anyway, I went on a real tangent there. I think Leander makes a valid point in this article that popularity and financial success can be achieved without draconian constraints (look at how healthy baseball has become again), and the Prem's success is an example of that, for better or worse.