Month: February 2020

It would not be fair while writing a blog about equal pay for women in sports to not dedicate a post to the United States Women’s National Soccer Team. The USWNT has been leading the fight for equal pay for years now. They have always been vocal about equal pay and rights for women in general. While they argue they are doing the same work the mens team is doing and being paid less, they also argue that they have to work harder for the visibility they receive.

The USWNT has made progress in their fight for equal pay as FIFA doubled the prize money for winning the 2019 World Cup from what it was in 2015. FIFA also plays all women’s matches on grass now, as many complaint came up from the women’s teams about playing on turf. Many think more injuries occur when playing on turf verses on the grass. Men’s teams never had to play on turf and the women argued that they shouldn’t either.

One of the major turning points in the USWNT fight for equal pay occurred just before the 2019 Women’s World Cup, which the U.S. was predicted to win. The USWNT filed a law suit against the U.S. Soccer Federation on the basis of gender discrimination. They law suit argues that the women’s team gets the short end of the stick in salary, where they play and train, how often they play and train, medical staff and equipment available, the coaching they receive, and transportation to games (The New York Times).

The influence the USWNT has on girls in sports all over the world showed through in the world cup, as many girls came to their games holding signs protesting for equal pay. Nike released a commercial right after the Women’s World Cup called “Never Stop Winning” that featured pictures of the USWNT and their supporters throughout the World Cup, along with encouraging words for women everywhere to join the fight.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S29GZOR-k9U

It was later released that the law suit against the U.S. Soccer Federation was for $67 million in backpay (Time). In the documentation submitted from each side for the law suit, both the contracts for the men and women teams have been submitted. The U.S. soccer federation claimed that the USWNT negotiated a different contract after being offered and denying a similar contract to the USMNT. The U.S. Soccer Federation says the difference in these contracts is the reason that the two teams are payed differently. The women’s contract included things like “guaranteed annual salaries, medical and dental insurance, paid child-care assistance, paid pregnancy and parental leave, severance benefits, multiple bonuses,” (Time.) Obviously things like paid pregnancy are not offered to the mens national team.

One of the most well known differences in payment of men and women’s teams is the money teams win in the world cup. According to The New York Times, there is $400 million that is available to be awarded to the mens teams participating in the world cup, of which there are 32. There is only around 40 million available to be awarded to women’s teams competing in the world cup, of which there are 24 (The New York Times). This means there is ten times the amount of money available for mens teams. Yes, they have 8 more teams competing, but that does not make up for the massive gap. This fight does not involve the U.S. Soccer Federation however since FIFA is the determiner of the prize money. Therefore is not included in the law suit.

However, this doesn’t mean the Soccer Federation is innocent. The US soccer federation gives the Women’s team a $25,000 bonus for winning. This bonus sounds nice, until you learn the fact that under the mens contract, they receive $3,000 more for if they loose in a World Cup qualifying match than the women receive for winning (Time). This means the men earn more for not even making into the world cup than the women do for winning the entire tournament. It is unclear what exactly in each team’s contract are responsible for this gap.

Megan Rapinoe spoke out against FIFA and CONCACAF during the World Cup, as they scheduled the Women’s World Cup final on the same day and same time as multiple mens cup soccer finals. The 2019 Copa America and 2019 Globe Cup Final were scheduled by CONCACAF after FIFA decided the date for the women’s final. She argued that if it was the Men’s World Cup, no other women’s competition would even be scheduled, let alone shown on some stations that are normally showing the World Cup. CONCACAF explained that this overlap was not intentional and by the time they realized the date, “it was too big of a mountain to move,” (CBS sports).

The law suit against the U.S. Soccer Federation will most likely turn into a trail. Even though the USWNT’s fight is far from over, the progress they made so far can not go without recognition.

The USWNT has inspired many other women’s soccer teams to fight for their rights as well. Norway now has equal pay for their men’s and women’s teams, Spain is in the fight for equal pay, and players on Brazil’s team went on strike in protest of equal pay (The New York Times). The influence of the USWNT goes beyond soccer as well, as the teams mentioned in past blogs, like women’s basketball fight for their rights.

Works Cited

https://time.com/5653250/uswnt-equal-pay-lawsuit/

https://www.cbssports.com/soccer/world-cup/news/megan-rapinoe-says-fifas-error-of-world-cup-gold-cup-finals-on-same-day-is-terrible-scheduling-for-everyone/

 

 

As I mentioned in my last blog post, Women in the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA) are speaking up about equality for women regarding pay and equal opportunities. For over a year, the WNBA has been fighter for “fair pay and play.” Notice how they use the word fair. I would like to emphasize that the women and others fighting for fair pay are NOT saying that they should be paid exactly as much as the mens basketball players. They are simply saying that they deserve more, proportional to the revenue that they bring in. They are also saying they deserve better and equal training facilities.

In the middle of January, a huge mile stone was reached in this push for equality. The WNBA has a new CBA (collective bargaining agreement) that will last eight years! According to Glamour, in a press release the WNBA said, “The 2020 CBA features significant investments by the league and its teams aimed directly at increasing player salary and compensation, improvements to the overall player experience, resources specifically designed with the professional female athlete in mind, as well as a commitment to implement an integrated marketing plan league-wide.”

The top players in the NBA will now be able to earn six figure salaries, more than half a million. This is the first time salaries for women in the WNBA will achieve an average salary that is six figures (Glamour). The CBA also includes deals for better equipment, whether that be for training or travel. As said in the article my Glamour, the CBA changes don’t equal equality for men and women, but we are moving in the right direction.

Now, it would not be right to only explain the end result of what has been a hard fight for women in basketball for many years.  In an article by Bleacher Report, Diggins-Smith, a WNBA player, explained that women only receive 20% of the WBNA revenue, while men receive 50% of their leagues revenue. Again this is obviously not proportionally equal. She also mentioned that women do not profit off of jersey sales like men do (Bleacher Report).

In 2018, Diggins-Smith, the highest plaid player on the Wings, was payed a salary in the low six figures. The lowest salary in the mens league was somewhere around 800,000 dollars. While again, it may be unreasonable to compare amounts directly when revenue of each league is not equal. It is clear that the gap should not be this big.

Women in the WNBA have never been afraid to speak up for themselves. They made their stance very clear and continued to spread the word about their fight. This is a tweet from a player that played for Los Angeles in 2018, after LeBron James received a 154 million dollar contract.

154M ……….. must. be. nice. We over here looking for a M 🙃 but Lord, let me get back in my lane pic.twitter.com/IFDZLlI53z

— A'ja Wilson (@_ajawilson22) July 2, 2018

There was obviously a lot of planning that occurred from the last couple years till now regarding pay for women in basketball. The fight was fought on two fronts, one concerning the WNBA league and the other concerning the women’s national basketball team,. Two women leading these plans were Sue Bird and Diana Taurasi, two players on the national basketball team. Something they pushed for was women receiving pay as they train for the olympics (this is very relevant as the Tokyo 2020 Olympics are only months away). This resulted in another win for women in basketball and it was decided that women could earn 100,000 dollars while training for the olympics (NBC).

While all the progress made by the WNBA and women’s basketball in general. It is always important to look at the other side of the argument. According to NBC, men in the NBA play over twice as many games and have a large fan base. These result in a massive difference in ticket sales. The question is how to decide what wages would be proportionally equal. There are two ways to look at the argument. A common argument for equal pay is that women are doing the same work, the same job as men and receiving less pay. In this case, Women Basketball plays half the games so they should get half the salary. This is not what happens as women basketball players would be payed on average around 3.5 million (the average men’s salary is 7 million). This is when the argument comes in that women shouldn’t make as much because they don’t bring in as much revenue. As said before, women in basketball are not being payed the same percentage of their revenue that men are.

In short, there are still many barriers and logistics that need to be worked out in order for there to be equality for women in sports. But, many famous women in sports who serve as role models in the fight continuously tell their fans to never give up. Know your worth and don’t budge (Sue Bird, Bleacher Report).

Works Cited:

https://www.glamour.com/story/the-women-of-the-wnba-just-scored-a-historic-victory-in-the-fight-for-equal-pay

https://bleacherreport.com/articles/2792349-skylar-diggins-smith-on-wnba-nba-wage-gap-im-at-a-loss-for-words-sometimes

https://www.nbcnews.com/know-your-value/feature/we-didn-t-back-down-how-women-s-basketball-players-ncna1131561