Driver salaries “should have been included in budget cap” says Brown

McLaren boss Zak Brown says that Formula 1 drivers salaries “should have been included” in the 2021 budget cap rules to promote teams to think about where they would invest their money.

In 2021 financial regulations are being made part of F1 for the first time, limiting teams to spending no more than $175m a season.
 
But there are still parts that aren’t included in that budget, driver salaries being one of them as well as marketing, heritage costs and power unit development.
 
“I think drivers should have been included in the budget cap, whatever that budget cap is,” said Brown (quoted by MotorsportWeek).
 
“I think what that would do is it would force teams to make decisions on where they want to spend money.
 
“It wouldn’t necessarily, if you felt driver made the biggest difference, keep paying your drivers what you’re paying them today, but I think it would have put pressure on the teams to figure out where do you get your biggest value.
 
“It wouldn’t have automatically reduced their salaries, but it would have forced teams to make more decisions on where to spend their money.”
 
Brown had preferred the initial figure for the budget cap which was a lower sum of money able to spend and fewer exclusions, but reckons a good compromise has been made with the increased number.
 
“[The ideal figure] was $150m plus fewer exclusions. Now it’s $175m plus more exclusions,” he added.
 
“I think what was presented in Bahrain [in 2018] was a better financial model that would have produced the same race results, maybe even arguably better race results because it would concertina the field that much more.
 
“For your shareholders, you like to provide them a return, and because we will run at the budget cap, had the budget been less, that would have provided a better return.
 
“But there’s compromise, the guys spending a lot more obviously wanted it to be higher.”