In case you missed it, the chance of a 2011-2012 NBA season happening took a major hit this week. On Tuesday, the NBA Players Association rejected the latest proposal from the owners, extending the lockout. As a result, the players plan to dissolve the NBAPA and then file antitrust lawsuits against the league, like the NFL players did in a failed attempt earlier this year.

Meanwhile, the league canceled all games through December 15, which accounts to approximately one-quarter of the NBA schedule. Most believe that more games than that will be canceled and many believe that the season will not take place at all. The lockout is getting uglier and the two sides are farther from reaching an agreement than ever before.

This is bad news for many people. It’s bad news for fans of the NBA and it’s bad for people who like to bet on the games. Gambling online on basketball will drop sharply without a professional basketball league going on, but at least there are still college games. Those who will be hurt the most, though, will not be the betters, the rich players or the rich owners. It will be the little people, those who work at the concession stands and ticket office of the basketball arenas, those who work at businesses near the arenas that see an increase of traffic on game day, and more.

One way of possibly resolving this is being proposed by William Ury, co-founder of the Harvard Project on Negotiation. He proposes a “smart strike,” where the games are played as usual, but neither the players nor owners are paid. Instead, all revenue goes into an escrow fund to be divided up later. It seems simple, which is why it will probably never happen. Ury adds that it is shameful “at a time when the country and so many millions of Americans are hurting, to have a struggle over whether a certain amount of millions goes here or there.” The escrow idea would allow the games to take place, and for the workers who rely on the NBA to get paid, while that is being worked out.