And now central offices across the sports map are scrambling to catch up. "When I think of pay equity, I think of the opportunity that the NBA and other male sports leagues have to be successful.". In October 2018, the G League announced it would provide new contracts worth $125,000 for elite prospects -- which meant it would pay some 18-year-old men more than any woman had ever earned from the WNBA in a year. Top players earn vastly more, such as Stephen Curry and Russell Westbrook, who make $48 million and $47 million a year, respectively. And shes not arguing they deserve NBA-sized salaries. The base salary for WNBA rookies varies on when (or if) players were selected in the WNBA Draft. As a point of comparison, the NBA didnt draw crowds of this size until its 26th season, when the league averaged 8,061 fans per game. Shes played in Russia for the past seven years, and she makes over $1 million per season. But in 2007, a furniture-store owner named Hilton Koch bought the club for $10 million, then couldn't pay its bills, and the team was disbanded the following year.) Let's delve into the reasons. The two sides channeled that willingness into the areas Engelbert and the league's negotiators discussed with Jackson, Ogwumike and the players, and reached an eight-year agreement in January. Which is kind of unbelievable, as WNBA All-Star point guard for the Dallas Wings, Skylar Diggins-Smith, put it recently: Before we even talk about base salary or anything like that, we dont even get paid the same percentage of the revenue that we bring in., Unfortunately, its not clear what the WNBAs exact revenue is, or individual teams, or their profits. Union president Ogwumike announced the move in an essay for The Players' Tribune titled "Bet on Women.". "I say this totally real I don't think we should get the same money as NBA players," Bird said. Diana . On May 1, a federal judge sided with U.S. Soccer on most of the key issues at stake in the lawsuit. At the same time, there's very little downside if a player happens to go bust, because even top rookies earn only about $50,000 a year. The WNBA has made strides to increase player salaries and find other ways to compensate players in the last CBA, which was ratified in 2020. It's about the value of the outputs. In 2021, Tacoma and Louisville are scheduled to open the first soccer-specific stadiums with National Women's Soccer League clubs as their highest-level tenants. That's the chain reaction of network externalities. Sign up for notifications from Insider! Diggins-Smith has made hundreds of thousands of dollars during her five seasons in the WNBA, yet she feels its unfair that she makes considerably less than NBA players. He covers an array of topics including NFL, Pop Culture, Fishing News, and the Outdoors. Taurasi ranks third in the league with a $234,936 salary. Reward is not a function of inputs such as work or effort; it is a function of the outputs, the product. On average, WNBA players make $75,000 a year in the league, with only a few players earning as much as $113,000. Beyond anticipating the savings from that huge gulf, Gulati had a second simple reason for paying men and women differently: U.S. Soccer replicates the compensation practices of FIFA, the organization that is by far the biggest driver of unequal pay in global soccer. ] To think of that and then to see how the numbers translate for guys who are bench players, guys who never see the floor. Low investment and media coverage have led to limited viewership, rights deals and sponsorships, which leads to low pay, which hampers the development of new talent and initiatives, which leads to low investment and media coverage. The NBA's collective bargaining agreement indicates the players must receive about 50% of the league's basketball-related income. ", "And then it's like a 15-year-old boy," she added. In 1953, at the same stage in its timeline, the NBA had total revenues of less than $16 million in today's dollars, according to data collected by the House Judiciary Committee in 1957, and drew only 3,583 fans per game. WNBA Star Argues Why Players Deserve To Be Paid More Like The NBA are vocal in their support of the womens league because of the quality of play and because they understand the hard work these women put into their game. The answer is that reward is not necessarily proportional to effort. NBAs teams generated $5.9 billion in revenue in 2015-16. From 1990 to 2012, for instance, MLB, NBA, NFL and NHL teams got a mammoth $17 billion in public funds for new homes, according to research by economists Robert Baade and Victor Matheson. Most Bangladeshis earn a living through agriculture, primarily cultivating rice and jute but also maize and vegetables. As fans, we deserve to see them playing at their highest level after a restful off-season. The reason Griner is in Russia in the first place was because she plays for UMMC Ekaterinburg in the Russian Womens Basketball Premier League. With this deadline looming, the players would be wise to take advantage of this opportunity and compel the league to come to the table with an offer commensurate to their worth. Just one woman was ranked among the 100 highest-paid athletes in the world in 2019, according to Forbes (Serena Williams, at No. After all, sponsors want exposure for their brand. What Should Be Done About the Gender Pay Gap in Sports? "It's not just FIFA that needs to be clear about the revenue that it's making from the Women's World Cup," says Molly Levinson, spokesperson for the U.S. women's national team. Her teamthe Minnesota Lynxalso finished with the best record in the WNBA. which tips off later this week in Tenerife, with the final on Sept. 30. will be spending a significant chunk of their year overseas playing on professional teams and in leagues in order to supplement their WNBA income. The league confirmed that all WNBA players other than Griner are out of Russia and Ukraine. There actually isn't any correct number, because income data isn't broken out anywhere for the Women's World Cup. TV viewership tells a similar story. 1 pick in the NBA draft in 2012. The raw numbers make it easy to assume that women make less money simply because fans prefer men's games -- that pay follows revenues, and revenues follow popularity. Beyond money, a sport needs time to grow into its potential audience. In an interview with comedian Adam Ray on his "About Last Night Podcast," the legendary Seattle Storm point guard and four-time WNBA champion explained her stance on equality in basketball. Which leads us here: The average NBA salary is about $7.5 million; according to the league, the average WNBA salary in 2019 was reportedly about $116,000, but a new collective bargaining agreement which runs from 2020 to 2027 provides a 53% pay increase, plus maternity leave at full salary, $5,000 for child care, and as much as $60,000 for They're not just bringing their skills to market, they're trying to make sure the market supports their skills. Think of cellphones: If you were the only person to have one, your phone would be useless. The athletes did want a larger share of league revenues. They want more open accounting and less obeisance to FIFA. In 2017, the league aired 20 games live on Twitter, while also offering a new fantasy game on the fantasy platform FanDuel. Under side-by-side photos of Bird and James, the photo compared the ballers' seasons in their respective leagues, number of championships, annual salary, and bonus for winning the Finals. The WNBA inked a landmark labor deal in January, guaranteeing improved pay and unprecedented health benefits, after its players opted out of their CBA for the first time. It would seriously impair our ability to support our mission and invest in these other critical developmental areas.". "We're not, and I think we should talk.". Any sport needs three kinds of support to grow into a large-scale, sustainable business. Now, Team USA is in Spain, about to play in the. Kevin Durant doesnt produce more basketball per hour worked than Breanna Stewart, the Seattle Storm forward who claimed the WNBA MVP award in just her third season. And yet, for all this effort, there is little economic reward. (In its most recent fiscal year, ending in March 2019, the USSF paid $304,113 to current men's coach Gregg Berhalter for four months of work, $241,869 to former coach David Sarachan, whom Berhalter replaced in December 2018, and $1.475 million to former coach Jurgen Klinsmann, who was fired in 2016. Economy, Not Misogyny, Drives Unequal Pay in Sports NBC and its fleet of cable channels showed a record 631.5 hours of the 2018 Winter Olympics -- and for the first time ever, a majority of prime-time airtime was devoted to women's sports, according to research by Andrew Billings of the University of Alabama and James Angelini of the University of Delaware. The financial disparities between the leagues are undeniable, and these women arent asking for the same multimillion-dollar salaries their male counterparts make (though that would be nice). IN THE UNITED STATES, we have now spent two generations since Title IX raising women athletes to compete on the same footing as men. ABOUT US. According to Summit Hoops, Fowles was paid $109,000 for all she did in 2017. You ladies should be on commercials everywhere. This per game mark is more than 10,000 fans below the per game mark seen in the NBA in 2016-17. Many of the women dont get lucrative endorsements, and getting into broadcasting or some other sports-adjacent field once they retire is not guaranteed. terry mcdonough aerodata. Athletes were traveling by cramped coach flights, sometimes by bus, and staying in shared hotel rooms and dormitory-style housing. Once again, though, we don't know expenses in the WNBA. The State . Like, I didn't make the meme! Do you really compare yourself to the NBA?' This simple. "I think they're going to all drag the federation along, hopefully to a place where there's equal pay and beyond.". Analysis: What equal pay in women's sports really means Last week, this exciting season of the WNBA ended after the Seattle Storm swept the Washington Mystics to win their third championship. This pay gap is very real. This lack of media coverage has always hampered womens sports. Many of the women dont get lucrative endorsements, and getting into broadcasting or some other sports-adjacent field once they retire is not guaranteed. And when LeBron James steps onto the court, it generates far more revenue for the Heat, Cavaliers, or Lakers than it does for the Lynx when Maya Moore does so. To grow the WNBA, he and the owners were prepared to, as he put it, "double down." And it's in the runup to that deadline that the two sides will collide again over the even bigger issues at hand. It's not about the amount of effort or the quantity of inputs. Which is kind of unbelievable, as WNBA All-Star point guard for the Dallas Wings, Skylar Diggins-Smith, : Before we even talk about base salary or anything like that, we dont even get paid the same percentage of the revenue that we bring in., its not clear what the WNBAs exact revenue is, or individual teams, or their profits. "The NWSL has the opportunity to be the best league in the world," says Becca Roux, executive director of the U.S. Women's National Team Players Association. Thats what makes me mad. Please do not edit the piece, ensure that you attribute the author and mention that this article was originally published on FEE.org. The main argument against paying WNBA players more is that the league simply isnt profitable, because no one watches it. In recent years, players, teams and even athletes in other sports ice hockey Olympic gold medalists, Canadian soccer pros and W.N.B.A. After pushing their bodies to the limit in their regular season and in an equally demanding World Cup, a whole lot of WNBA players will be spending a significant chunk of their year overseas playing on professional teams and in leagues in order to supplement their WNBA income. Consider a comparison: Anthony Davis was the No. The WNBA will suffer if they dont figure out some way to pay players more. Worldwide, 18% of university presidents, 11% of astronauts who have been to space and 6% of major-company CEOs are women. And that's led to more viewers (Women's College World Series ratings have increased by nearly 40% since 2000), more revenues (up 360% from 2003 to 2016) and, in turn, more broadcasts (more than 1,600 games, including all of the playoffs, were scheduled for this season before the pandemic struck). * Mina Kimes talks with two-time World Cup and Olympic soccer champion Julie Foudy for a candid, inside look at the battle over fair pay for female players. Investment includes public money too, usually in the form of taxpayer-financed stadiums. So did Major League Soccer commissioner Don Garber. "I believed," he said, "the WNT was much more likely to qualify for and succeed in their tournament than the MNT was.". They have different collective bargaining agreements with U.S. Soccer, which pays base salaries, NWSL subsidies and performance bonuses to women while compensating men through much larger bonuses. Critically, they have called on U.S. Soccer to spend more on marketing, in part by investing much more in the NWSL. Demanding that female players be paid what they deserve is not about comparing the WNBA to the NBA as apples-to-apples salaries. In the WNBA the range of salaries is $117K to $215K for the highest-paid players. That's the other kind of equity: ownership. For example, according to World Bank data, in 2012, the value added per agricultural worker was $61,634 in the United States. Jackson posted the phrase "language of investment" on her office wall. Not to discredit any work that they've put in, but you have women playing year-round basketball going overseas to have more opportunities for higher wages. Most major sites have now joined ESPN, which launched espnW in 2010, in allocating space to women's sports across multiple dedicated pages, particularly for basketball and soccer. Those are honorable reasons to stick with the WNBA, but players shouldnt have to choose between these personal anchors to the league and their need to make a living. A post shared by Kelsey Plum (@kelseyplum10). Charles Barkley on WNBA Stars: 'Y'all Should Not Have to Go to These Another argument is that women's national teams for sports like soccer have far more success than the men's national team. Sue Bird: 'I Don't Think We Should Get the Same Money As NBA Players' . Meanwhile, over the same span, women's coach Jill Ellis, winner of back-to-back World Cups, earned $390,409.) According to Summit Hoops, Fowles was paid $109,000 for all she did in 2017. As demands for equal pay spark across arenas, boardrooms, TV screens, Twitter feeds and even presidential campaigns, it's time to take a deeper look. Much more than ever before, the women who become professionals are now building the public support, partnerships and organizations they need to get paid what they are fully worth. Im not going to call out some of the bad NBA players we got in commercials but yall know who they are.. What if non-player. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, except for material where copyright is reserved by a party other than FEE. "As many rights for FIFA competitions are sold to commercial affiliates as a package, specific commercial revenues for the FIFA Women's World Cup cannot be distinguished from the overall revenue from FIFA competitions," FIFA said in a statement to ESPN. "These are businesses, and none of us are out there saying we want to be paid the exact same as the men," says 17-year WNBA veteran Sue Bird of the Seattle Storm. 2023 NBA Free Agents Who Would Be Foolish to Change Teams The interview with Wealthsimple took place a month after Diggins-Smith told a Dallas Morning News writer it was appalling what WNBA players make compared to their male counterparts in the NBA. Last season, NBA broadcasts averaged around five times that. According to the WNBA, this was most-watched regular season since 2014, with viewership across ESPN networks and NBA TV up by 31 percent. 'Thank you to Auntie Shania': Washington State team sees its idol, Fantasy women's basketball: Why to focus on guards early in your draft. Essentially, the women and men all around the table decided to partner in growing their game. "People think we think that when we say things like 'We want equality.'". To secure international friendlies, the men's team pays and sometimes earns appearance fees, which don't exist for women. Silver was ready to hear about investment and commitment and even empowerment. It all. Part of HuffPost News. Indeed, in the developed world, we work much less than our ancestors did, and we do it for a far higher standard of living. For instance, FIFA says the 2018 men's World Cup generated $5.4 billion in revenue. Im the highest paid player on the Dallas Wings, and my salary is in the low six figures. The U.S.-Netherlands final reached an average live audience of 82.2 million, up 56%. Heading into this season, he had made six All-Star teams, and he created 0.247 win shares per 48 minutes in 2018-19. But the NBAs politically correct heart has room to grow a few sizes. It was an unprecedented moment for a commissioner of a professional sports league and a head of a union: The labor deal they were about to negotiate could become a major platform for women's empowerment. Can you guess in which season they rested Diana Taurasi and earned the league's No. Pow!) U.S. Soccer is at a crossroads: Whatever happens with the equal pay lawsuit, the USSF has to negotiate a new collective bargaining agreement with the women's national team by the end of next year, and its long-term relationship with the National Women's Soccer League is up in the air. Last year, Delanie Gourley, a star pitcher in National Pro Fastpitch softball, disclosed that she makes less than a Yankees bat boy. "We're just like 'Could I get the same media coverage, and the corporate sponsor looks, and things like that?'" Of 199 countries for which the World Bank has GDP data for, in 2012 Bangladesh ranked 175th. NOW WATCH: 11 barbers who do more than just a standard cut, Visit Insider's homepage for more stories, Sue Bird said her legacy is 'already written' and described her last 2 WNBA championships as bonuses because she's playing 'on borrowed time', How the masterminds behind the WNBA's bubble successfully avoided an outbreak in the heart of a COVID-19 hotspot, Russell Wilson said he felt 'like Sue Bird in the clutch' after a brilliant performance, and the WNBA legend explained why that's important, WNBA Finals MVP Breanna Stewart crashed Sue Bird's press conference in a hilarious, booze-filled, post-championship exchange, Sue Bird clarified that she doesn't think WNBA players "should get the same money as NBA players" in an interview with Adam Ray on his "About Last Night Podcast. But the risk also offered reward: 15 million Americans self-identify as LGBTQ, and they represent a market segment worth around $830 million. 'Bet on me': Griner seems like old self in first interview since detainment, Serena announces she's pregnant with 2nd child, Healthy Delle Donne excited for Mystics' season, Griner: 1st practice 'everything I wanted it to be', Alcaraz, Swiatek cruise into Madrid round of 16, Hannah Green wins LPGA at Wilshire in a playoff, Halep questions long delay for doping hearing, Suns, Mercury cut cable, moving to new TV setup, How Hailey Van Lith's transfer impacts NCAA champion LSU. In August, WNBA president Lisa Borders said, While I encourage WNBA players to speak out on issues important to them, it is equally important that they understand the realities of our business., Nows a good time for players to advocate for themselves because the product in the WNBA has never been better. I personally love watching the WNBA because these women are extremely talented shooters, ball handlers and passers and I find the teamwork displayed by WNBA teams to be something that the NBA could take a lesson or two from. . But by the time Megan Rapinoe, Alex Morgan and their mates were celebrating their triumph, the world knew they would earn just $4 million collectively, a fraction of what their male counterparts had taken home a year earlier. In the NBA, players take home around 50% of shared revenue and in the WNBA players only take home 20% of shared revenue. Currently, the NBA pays its players 50 percent of its total revenue. The women of the WNBA are simply seeking the recognition they deserve for their performances. B/R Live shows the Women's FIH Pro League, where women's national field hockey teams face off; FloSports streams Premier Girls Fastpitch, a top club softball league for high school and younger players. ", The salary gap between men and women athletes echoes the huge difference in revenues between men's and women's sports. Finally, sports need media to reach their full potential. At least not yet. what happened to oleg penkovsky family. Pay is so low that it has compelled most American athletes to play overseas as well as in the WNBA just to make a living, increasing their wear and tear and their injury risk. The U.S. women have been playing so well that they now generate nearly as much money as the men on game days, despite typically lower official ticket prices. We put bad NBA players in commercials before some of yall superstars. But here's the thing. Demanding that female players be paid what they deserve is not about comparing the WNBA to the NBA as apples-to-apples salaries. Barkley reiterated his feelings by expressing how he doesnt get how some NBA players earn more sponsorship deals than superstar WNBA players. Because these women deserve more money. The women's national team filed a wage discrimination act against US Soccer, and in turn received a significant raise, increased game bonuses, improved per diem stipends, better travel benefits,. But the truth is more complicated, because a league's financial data also embeds its history, opportunities and labor relations. And no one wants to see the WNBA die, least of all the players. Of course, compensation has always been a serious issue in the WNBA, which paid its players one-ninety-sixth the NBA's average salary at the time Jackson and Silver chatted. But they were actually paid just $27.7 million. "Let the women play in more feminine clothes like they do in volleyball. Thats right: These professional athletes have second jobs. One of the reasons we're even talking about equal pay in sports today is because of the courageous fight of. But the number was wrong. We had incredibly thrilling semifinals series that went a full five games apiece. Today, grassroots support for the national teams seem to be at parity. It would collapse without the support of the NBA, and it can't afford to pay the players more. "If players are talking ridiculous salaries ," Silver began. Also a six-time All-Star, she had a nearly identical 0.248 win shares per 48 minutes in 2019. "Every time FIFA bundles broadcast rights, it ascribes no value to the Women's World Cup," Roux says. Sometimes, it is pretty easy to see why vast amounts of effort generate little output and, hence, low incomes. For instance, 994 million people watched at least one minute of the 2019 Women's World Cup on linear television, a 30% increase from 2015, while 3.26 billion watched a minute or more of the men's World Cup in 2018, up just 2% from four years earlier. "This new CBA is going to dramatically change how this league operates," Bird says. WNT members wore their jerseys inside out in protest. We had incredibly thrilling semifinals series that went a full five games apiece. "The good news is that folks outside the federation, from sponsors to broadcasters to partners, are incredibly bullish on the U.S. women's national team and on women's football," Levinson says. Suppose we take the various rates of compensation for the men's national team -- bonuses for appearances and wins in friendlies, tournaments and World Cups -- and apply them to the members of the women's national team, player by player. FIFA commingles broadcasting rights and sponsorships for the men's and women's tournaments. Plenty of signs indicate that will happen, and it should. Las Vegas Aces point guard Kelsey Plum wants to change that. The most common explanation about why players go overseas in the first place is often distilled to three words: to get rich. And while companies have shown more interest in backing female athletes recently, men's leagues and teams still captured 93% of the $31 billion that corporations around the globe spent on sports last year, according to a November 2019 report by the German research firm Statista. When Carlos Cordeiro, then president of the U.S. Soccer Federation, began speaking in front of City Hall, shouts drowned him out: At that time, U.S. Soccer was already battling the women's national team in court, after all 28 members sued their national federation in March 2019 for "purposeful gender discrimination." What do WNBA players make overseas? Not as much as you've heard EXPLAINER: Why WNBA players go overseas to play in offseason It's true players can substantially supplement their W income, which . While men have always played on grass, FIFA staged the 2015 Women's World Cup at arenas with artificial turf, which American striker Sydney Leroux, one of dozens of athletes who protested, likened to "running pretty much on cement." When it comes to others opinions, I feel as though we get picked on enough, and not getting paid fairly makes it even worse. ", FIFA has a notoriously checkered past with women athletes. "Female players are pretty, if you excuse me saying so," former FIFA president Sepp Blatter opined in 2004. Obviously, if a player can only negotiate with one team, their salary will be depressed. WNBA players arent asking to be paid on par with their NBA counterparts. Bird said direct comparisons like the one above "comes back on me.". And the highest paid players in the WNBA this season will earn an annual salary of $234,936, according to HerHoopStats. Note: This piece has been updated with a response from the WNBA indicating that the league does share its financials with the players union. Major League Baseball is a $10 billion-in-revenue giant while the NPF players make an average of $5,000 to $6,000 because of the league's low revenue. And overall, viewers consumed 2.49 billion hours of coverage across all platforms, a jump of 93%. As just one brutal example, 2018 league MVP Breanna Stewart ruptured her right Achilles tendon in April 2019 while playing for Dynamo Kursk in the EuroLeague women's championship. Show Her The Money: Why Female Athletes Deserve Higher Pay - Forbes
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