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Do female athletes deserve equal compensation compared to males?

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1. Why do pay gaps exist? Should revenue generation be a deciding factor on pay level?

2. When and how should governing bodies address the pay disparities among male and female players?

3. Should stakeholders (fans, sponsors, politicians, etc.) engage in the fight for equal pay in women’s sports or should they stay silent?

4. Do you think athletic performance levels should be an indicator of pay level? Are there other factors that should be considered?

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"This is a roadmap that you build on...What do you want to leave for the next generation of players?"

Julie Foudy shares on how monumental this moment in time is for womens' sports and pay equality. Today's athletes are seeking more than just the literal definition of pay equity. They also want the action that comes with it and are holding their governing bodies accountable.

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0:00 / 2:29•Watch full video

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Julie Foudy on the significance of the USWNT’s equal pay settlement | SportsCenter

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How U.S. Soccer and Its Players Got to Equal Pay: a Timeline (Published 2022)

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A six-year legal fight that saw victories on the field and losses in federal court ended with a multimillion-dollar settlement and new contracts guaranteeing equal pay. Here’s how the sides made peace.

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What the US Soccer Equal Pay Case means for Sports

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What the US Soccer Equal Pay Case means for Sports

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This article focuses on the outcome of the US Women Soccer Players Association's six-year discrimination and equal pay suit. The governing body of soccer in the US agreed to pay a settlement of $24 million and is now equalizing pay and bonuses to those on the men's team.

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Settling a discrimination case, American soccer's governing body agreed to pay $24 million, and made a commitment to equal pay and bonuses to match the men's team. Image: USA TODAY Sports

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What the US soccer equal pay case means for sports

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Settling a discrimination case, American soccer's governing body agreed to pay $24 million, and made a commitment to equal pay and bonuses to match the men's team.

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Credit... Illustration by Sam Manchester/The New York Times

Update: The United States women's national team This primer, from 2016, explains in broad terms (and using numbers from that time) the differing pay structures under which the teams are paid by U.S. Soccer. sued U.S. Soccer for gender discrimination in federal court in March 2019, citing what the players said were pervasive inequalities in the treatment of their team and the men's national team. In May 2020, a judge dismissed the players' equal pay claims. U.S. Soccer and top players agree to guarantee equal pay. Read the latest.
The core fact is not in dispute: The players on the World Cup-winning United States women's national soccer team earn less money than their counterparts on the men's national team. After that truth, things are muddier. How much less? How can that be fair? And most important: What is being done about it?

U.S. Soccer and the union representing the players on the women's team have traded court filings and accusations - in a lawsuit filed by U.S. Soccer over the validity of the team's collective bargaining agreement and in a wage-discrimination complaint filed by five top players last month. Amid all of this, we gave both sides the opportunity to make their case using U.S. Soccer's public (and private) financial data. What we found suggests a complicated battlefield.

In a wage-discrimination complaint filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in March, five top players on the women's team accused U.S. Soccer of paying them and their teammates about a quarter of what their counterparts on the men's national team receive. Wielding the federation's own financial reports as evidence, the women excoriated a compensation and bonus structure that they said tilted heavily in favor of the men and pointed out that their team's on-field success had produced millions of dollars in revenue for U.S. Soccer in 2015 and was projected to do the same this year.

In most years? Yes. Over the long term, the more established men's game brings in consistently higher game revenue year over year. (Sponsorships and television revenue are not counted in game revenue calculations; Nike, Fox Sports and ESPN, for example, are "buying the crest," in U.S. Soccer vernacular, not the rights to a single team.)

But in 2015, the women's team won the World Cup and then embarked on a scheduled 10-city victory tour that yielded an eight-figure bump to U.S. Soccer's bottom line.

As a result, the women brought in more than $23 million in game revenue, about $16 million more than the federation had projected. An anomaly? Yes. And a welcome one if you are U.S. Soccer.

After expenses, the women turned a profit of $6.6 million last year. The men? Their profit was just under $2 million. Looking ahead, U.S. Soccer's 2017 budget predicts that trend will be repeated: Expecting another Olympic gold medal, and another victory tour, the federation has forecast a profit of more than $5 million for the women's team in the next fiscal year (on $17.5 million in revenue).

The men? U.S. Soccer figures they will lose about $1 million this year (on only $9 million in revenue).

Yes and no. According to figures provided by U.S. Soccer, since 2008 it has paid 12 players at least $1 million. Six of those players were men, and six were women. And the women hold their own near the top of the pay scale; the best-paid woman made about $1.2 million from 2008 to 2015, while the top man made $1.4 million in the same period. Some women in the top 10 even made more than their male counterparts over those years. But the numbers diverge down the list. At No. 25, the female player made just under $341,000, and the corresponding male player supplemented his salary by about $580,000. At No. 50, the male player made 10 times as much as his female counterpart.

Part of that is structural; a bigger player pool, a more fluid roster and higher game bonuses have given more men a chance to take money out of U.S. Soccer's cash drawer. But there is also another important distinction about the women's pay, said Rich Nichols, the general counsel for the United States Women's National Soccer Team Players Association. "Seventy-five percent of that compensation, both last year and over those eight years, is directly related to winning championships," he said. In other words, Nichols said, the women have to perform at a world-beating level just to keep pace financially. And that victory tour money? The women had to play the extra games to get it. "The men," Nichols said, "get paid just for showing up." What he and his players want, they say, is equal pay for equal work.

Not exactly. To qualify for the Women's World Cup, for example, the United States women's team plays five games in a single two-week tournament.

The men's qualifying road is a two-year, 16-game slog across North and Central America and the Caribbean. U.S. Soccer argues that the roster bonuses for successful qualification - $15,000 for the women in 2015, $55,000 for the men in 2014 - reflect that.

And while U.S. Soccer also counts the women's biweekly salaries (compensation that the male players do not receive) as a mitigating factor in its favor in the pay-equity dispute, the women play more games on a year-to-year basis and must win them to claim their bonuses, effectively requiring them to work harder and perform better just to keep pace.

The pay plans differ for the men's and women's national teams, who have their own players' associations and negotiate their own collective bargaining agreements. The women's team's pay is a mix of a base salary - $72,000 for the majority of players on the regular roster - plus a modest game bonus ($1,350) for each game won. (The women do not receive game bonuses if they tie or lose matches.) U.S. Soccer also pays the salaries of the national team players who compete in the N.W.S.L., the nascent American women's professional league, as well as providing some health insurance benefits, severance pay for players cut from the team and maternity leave at half pay if they become pregnant.

The men, meanwhile, operate on a pay-for-play system: Those players who are called in for matches are eligible for roster and game bonuses considerably higher than those paid to the women, but a player must be called into camp to receive anything. So when Tim Howard took a year off after the 2014 World Cup, he earned no pay from U.S. Soccer for the games he missed. Any player who is injured, or one who is on the fringes of the national team player pool and is not called in for months or years, receives nothing until he returns to camp. The security net is that every male player in the pool, unlike the women, has the advantage of falling back on a lucrative salary from his professional club.

It is important to view the dispute between U.S. Soccer and the women's national team in a larger context. In the wake of its Women's World Cup triumph, the popularity and profitability of the team are at record levels. At the same time, the women's national team players' association is in the middle of negotiations for a new collective bargaining agreement with U.S. Soccer - one that is likely to determine the players' pay and working conditions through the next World Cup or two. (The battle over artificial turf lurks right behind the pay fight.) The players contend that their big year in 2015 is a sign of a bright future and that their visibility and on-field success have made them the driving economic force of U.S. Soccer. The federation counters, using figures like those in the charts above, that the women have received comparable pay and that men's team still consistently produces a larger share of U.S. Soccer's revenue year to year.

Sunil Gulati, U.S. Soccer's president and a lecturer in economics at Columbia University, contends that revenue has to be a big part of any discussion about compensation. "A lot of different things go into the compensation for the women's players," he said last month, citing revenue and performance as the most prominent examples. "We want to compensate them fairly." Gulati also said that television ratings were another factor; while the women's team broke viewing records during the Women's World Cup, ratings for men's games have been more than double those for women's games, on average, since 2012, according to Nielsen calculations. Excluding World Cup games, the men's team's ratings are almost four times as high.

The new FIFA president, Gianni Infantino, seems to agree with Gulati's point of view. He told Sports Illustrated last week that "the prize money today is linked with the revenues that are generated." But Infantino has also expressed a desire to create a new women's division in FIFA, focused solely on promoting women's soccer globally. And everyone can agree that FIFA's putting its shoulder behind improving opportunity and compensation in women's soccer, which remains an afterthought - or nonexistent - in many countries, would be a huge step forward.

The ones in which U.S. Soccer pays the women $60 a day for expenses and the men $75? Or $3,000 for a sponsor appearance while the men receive $3,750? These are probably the most embarrassing numbers in the pay-equity debate for U.S. Soccer, because they are indefensible. (Carli Lloyd mocked them acidly in her recent New York Times essay, writing that "maybe they think women are smaller and thus eat less.") In truth, those payments were equal before 2015, when an adjustment negotiated into the men's C.B.A. increased them for the men. The problem was that there was no clause in the women's C.B.A. that would ensure that the payments remained equal in the event that the men - whose C.B.A. comes up for renewal in different years - received a bump.

It will, and possibly very soon: U.S. Soccer officials have had discussions in recent weeks about moving to make the per diem and appearance payments match immediately, even before a new C.B.A. is negotiated. There even has been talk of making up the difference going back to the date in 2015 when they diverged. "The per diems will be returned to the same amount as the men in the upcoming negotiating cycle," Neil Buethe, a U.S. Soccer spokesman, said Tuesday, adding that the federation would "include language in future C.B.A.s to prevent this kind of discrepancy."

U.S. Soccer received $9 million when the men's team advanced to the second round of the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, but only about $2 million when the women won the 2015 World Cup in Canada. That is because FIFA pays out far more to participants in the men's World Cup, a financial juggernaut, than it does to Women's World Cup teams. Could U.S. Soccer choose to allocate that revenue differently, or to pool it to ensure that it was at least equal? Yes. But the men's team would surely object.

The E.E.O.C. complaint will take a minimum of six months to investigate, according to labor experts familiar with the process, meaning that its resolution might not come until after a new collective bargaining agreement is in place. The sides continue to trade filings in U.S. Soccer's suit over the validity of the current C.B.A. in federal court in Chicago. A decision is not expected until early June. If the court rules for the players, and throws out the C.B.A., they will have enormous leverage on the eve of the Olympics, including the ability to strike. If U.S. Soccer wins, there will be little to do but continue negotiations on a new agreement before the existing one expires on Dec. 31. In either case, the players will probably emerge with an improved deal - but only if serious discussions resume.

The sides, who last met face to face in March, agreed on Wednesday to sit down again - in mid-May.

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Pay Disparity in U.S. Soccer? It's Complicated (Published 2016)

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Update: The United States women's national team This primer, from 2016, explains in broad terms (and using numbers from that time) the differing pay structures under which the teams are paid by U.S. Soccer. sued U.S.

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US Women's National Team Salary Increase 

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US Women's National Team Salary Increase 

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The total compensation per player for 2022 is expected to be $327,000. The agreement provides equal benefits across the board for both the women’s and men’s national teams including travel benefits, venues, and field surface selection and other lodging accommodations. The two teams will join a revenue share agreement, splitting commercial revenue from ticket sales as well as broadcast and sponsorship partners.

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The USWNT's Mediation With U.S. Soccer Broke Down This Week. 

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The USWNT Seeks Nearly $67 Million in Damages In Equal Pay Lawsuit Against U.S. Soccer. Here's What to Know About the Case

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Mediation between the U.S. Women's National Soccer team and U.S. Soccer over equal pay has ended. Here's what to know about the lawsuit.

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Here the US Soccer Federation answers many questions around their move toward equal pay among male and female athletes. The most notable topics include the federation's stance on equal pay, pay determination for female players, and player contracts.

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1.    What is the U.S. Soccer Federation’s (USSF) stance on equal pay for the U.S. Women’s National Team (USWNT)?

U.S. Soccer is 100% committed to equal pay for our national team players. That’s our goal, that’s our focus, and that’s how we are going to bring the game forward in the United States. We have offered the women’s team the exact same bonus amounts as the men’s team for games U.S. Soccer controls and remain committed to providing equal compensation. We support not only the USWNT, but women around the world in their continued fight for equal pay and equal treatment in the workplace.

2.    How does the current USSF leadership team’s approach differ from that of past leadership?

USSF President Cindy Parlow Cone is a two-time Olympic Gold medalist and was a member of the iconic U.S. women’s team that won the 1999 FIFA Women's World Cup. She has been in the shoes of the current USWNT players and understands their perspectives intimately. Cindy and the entire USSF leadership team are 100% committed to equal pay and to doing right by the USWNT.

3.    Do U.S. Men’s National Team (USMNT) players make more money than USWNT players?

No. From 2015 to 2019, USWNT players made more money than USMNT players as a team both overall and on an average per-game basis. USSF paid the four USWNT class representatives in the equal pay lawsuit more than the four highest paid USMNT players.

4.    Does the USWNT have to play more games to get paid as much as the USMNT?

No. Between 2015 to 2019, the USWNT played 111 total games and made $24.5 million overall, averaging $220,747 per game.  The USMNT played 87 total games and made $18.5 million overall, averaging $212,639 per game.  The USWNT did play more games due to the difference in competitions and international calendar than the USMNT, but they also earned more money than the USMNT per game.

5.    Is it true that, compared to the USMNT, the USWNT regularly has sub-standard travel and lodging accommodations when traveling for work?

No. The USWNT regularly stays at some of the finest hotel properties in the world. In terms of travel, since the start of 2018 until July 1, 2021, the USWNT and USMNT have chartered the exact same number of flights.

6.    Why didn’t U.S. Soccer choose to participate in the recent “LFG” movie about the USWNT’s fight for equal pay?

The filmmakers came to us at the last minute – after they had been conducting interviews with others for more than a year. Regardless, we spoke with them and reached the unfortunate – and now proven – conclusion that the movie would not present a balanced view of the facts, with or without our active participation. We even provided them specific information, such as the fact that the USWNT at that time had chartered more flights than the USMNT and they chose to ignore that information. Bottom line, these facts were available and were omitted from the production.

7.    Who decides how much the USWNT is paid?

The USWNT’s compensation is the result of a collective bargaining agreement (CBA) made between USSF and the USWNT’s players association – the United States Women’s National Soccer Team Players Association (WNTPA). USSF is required by law to abide by this collectively bargained deal, negotiated and agreed to by the USWNT and their representatives. The same is true of U.S. Soccer’s CBA negotiated with and agreed to by the USMNT and their players association, the United States National Soccer Team Players Association (USNSTPA).

8.    How does the Federation explain the differences in its contracts with the USWNT and the USMNT?

Our national teams are represented by two different players associations who separately negotiate CBAs on behalf of their teams. The contracts in place are the result of extensive bargaining processes, shaped by the priorities of each of these groups of players.

During U.S. Soccer’s last negotiation with the WNTPA, the USWNT was offered the exact same pay-for-play compensation structure that the USMNT operates under, but the WNTPA rejected that offer.  They ultimately asked for and agreed to a different compensation model, which provided them with guaranteed pay. Even after the last USWNT deal was inked, U.S. Soccer again offered the USWNT the exact same compensation as the USMNT for all U.S. Soccer-controlled games. The USWNT rejected that as well. In part, that’s why when the women’s national team sued U.S. Soccer, a judge threw out their claim.

USMNT players do not receive any minimum guaranteed salaries, and they get paid only when they play. The USWNT, on the other hand, chose a deal that favored guaranteed contracts with U.S. Soccer, meaning contracted USWNT players have a set salary and benefits. The USWNT has valued the stability offered by guaranteed pay and benefits.

9.    Why doesn’t USSF have one master agreement for both the men and the women’s national teams?

U.S. Soccer supports one master agreement for the men’s and women’s national teams, and we have offered this to both players associations, but the union representatives for both the men’s and women’s teams have not supported a universal framework to date.

10.  Why is there such a huge difference in prize money awarded for performance in the Men’s and Women’s World Cups?

The massive difference in prize money awarded for men’s and women’s World Cups is dictated entirely by soccer’s global governing body, FIFA. FIFA alone controls those funds and pays them to national soccer federations around the world. U.S. Soccer is legally obligated to then distribute those funds based on our contracts with the men’s and women’s teams.

11.  What is U.S. Soccer doing to pressure FIFA to eliminate the gap in prize money?

U.S. Soccer has continued and will continue to press FIFA to eliminate the gap in prize money. Importantly, we are only one of 211 national soccer federations across the world. Although we have pushed FIFA continuously to treat the genders more equitably, our leverage is limited. Addressing this massive gap in FIFA prize money will require the constructive and creative engagement of the women’s and men’s teams here in the U.S., as well as like-minded soccer federations around the world.

12.  What exactly is the USWNT asking for in their equal pay lawsuit?

They are asking U.S. Soccer to cover past and future differences in FIFA prize money, totaling well over $50 million for the past two World Cups, and an unknown amount for future World Cups. FIFA alone controls those funds and pays them to national soccer federations around the world. U.S. Soccer is legally obligated to then distribute those funds based on our contracts with the men’s and women’s teams.

13.  Can the Federation use its own money to make up the difference in World Cup prize money that the USWNT is asking for?

Unlike most national governing bodies, U.S. Soccer already distributes over 100% of the FIFA Women’s World Cup prize money earned by the USWNT players to the USWNT players. The gap in prize money was created and is maintained by FIFA and it is simply not feasible for U.S. Soccer to make it up.

The U.S. Soccer Federation is not a professional sports league. We are a non-profit, member-based organization, meaning every dollar we make goes right back into the game. Asking U.S. Soccer to close the gap created by FIFA is untenable and would likely bankrupt the Federation or at the very least, put the Federation in an incredibly challenging financial situation that would eliminate our ability to fund important programs for coaches and referees and would eliminate our youth national teams and our youth development for boys and girls.

14.  Why doesn’t U.S. Soccer pool its FIFA prize money and distribute it evenly among the USWNT and the USMNT?

It would be illegal for U.S. Soccer to redistribute its FIFA World Cup prize money in a way that doesn’t comply with our CBAs under which we currently operate with the USWNT and the USMNT. Currently, pooling our FIFA prize money and distributing it evenly would not comply with those agreements, and U.S. Soccer cannot unilaterally change that fact. We would love to work with our national teams and their players associations to make history as the first national governing body to pool its FIFA prize money and distribute it evenly, but we can’t do so without successful renegotiations of both of our national teams’ CBAs to include this arrangement.

15.  Haven’t other countries around the world been able to successfully figure out how to pay their men’s and women’s national teams equally, including providing equal World Cup prize money?

This is a problem that not a single national governing body has been able to solve. Brazil, Australia, Norway, New Zealand, and England have all equalized the compensation for games that they control, exactly what USSF has and will continue to offer to the USWNT. The efforts of these other national governing bodies have been widely reported, and in some cases lauded by equal pay proponents, as accomplishing equal pay, but not one of them has equalized World Cup prize money between the men’s and women’s teams or has pooled and shared World Cup prize money between the teams.

16.  What is the status of the USSF’s ongoing CBA negotiations with the USWNT and the USMNT?

The USWNT’s current deal ends this year. The USMNT’s CBA expired at the end of 2018.  We have continued and will continue to work closely with representatives from the USMNT and are confident that we’re making good progress towards a deal.  Our aim through collective bargaining with our national teams is to reach agreements that address the players’ priorities, including developing new ways for our teams and organization to continue to grow and prosper together. We are proud that our athletes are already among the highest paid in the world, and we’re confident that working together we can reach agreements that we all feel good about moving forward.

17.  How much money does USSF make?

U.S. Soccer is a non-profit, member-based organization. Detailed financial information, including audited financial statements, can be accessed and reviewed in the Governance section of our website.

18.  The USWNT has higher TV ratings and brings in more revenue than the USMNT, so don’t they deserve at least equal pay?

We want all of our national teams, from the senior women’s and men’s teams to our youth national teams, Para-7-a-Side, beach and futsal to have all of their games broadcast, to be watched by as many people as possible and to generate revenue. But we have a long way to go.

As we sit here today, not all of our National Team matches are broadcast on English and Spanish television, but we will continue to encourage our broadcast partners to invest in the game at all levels.

While it has been reported that the USWNT has higher TV ratings than the USMNT, that is not always true.

We’re proud to say that the USWNT did generate the highest TV ratings for any soccer game with an audience of 26.9 million for the 2015 Women’s World Cup Final.

But that fact is often extrapolated to conclude that the USWNT has higher TV ratings overall.

On average, the USMNT has higher TV ratings, whether it is a friendly or a World Cup match.

Regarding revenue generation, there’s a number of reports stating accurately that the USWNT generated more revenue than the USMNT in fiscal years 2016-2018.

Here are the facts:

From fiscal years 2009 to 2015, the USWNT was $22 million in the red, while the USMNT earned $2.6 million.

From fiscal years 2015 to 2020, the USWNT was $211k in the red, while the USMNT was $5.7 million in the red.

So, in total, since 2009, the USWNT has been minus $22 million in terms of cost/revenue, while the USMNT has been minus $3.4 million in cost/revenue.

While we always aim to generate revenue from the senior National Team matches we control, the cost of putting on those matches usually exceeds the revenue generated from them on both the men’s and women’s side. However, we always view supporting our senior National Teams as important investments in the future of the game.

19. Who will pay the USWNT players for playing in the NWSL?

Under U.S. Soccer’s current proposal, the USWNT players will be paid by NWSL clubs for playing in the league while U.S. Soccer will continue to pay the players for USWNT duties.

With the NWSL in a solid position with continued room to grow, U.S. Soccer and the NWSL agreed that the Federation would no longer be the NWSL’s manager as of December 2020.  That means, starting in 2022, NWSL clubs will begin paying salaries directly to those USWNT players who choose to play in the NWSL.  USSF will no longer allocate or pay players to play in the NWSL.

The NWSL’s maturation is a significant and incredibly positive development for the growth of women’s game in the United States and abroad.  What U.S. Soccer is proposing mirrors the standard approach across the world where salaries for league play are paid by the professional clubs.

While U.S. Soccer will no longer pay the USWNT players for NWSL league play, it has and will continue to provide financial assistance to the NWSL. U.S. Soccer was instrumental in starting the NWSL in 2013, providing more than $20 million during the league’s early years to ensure its long-term sustainability – including paying salaries to all USWNT players allocated to play in the NWSL (up to 22), in addition to the $100,000 a year salary that U.S. Soccer was otherwise paying to contracted USWNT players for their National Team performance.

20. Does that mean the USWNT players playing in the NWSL will be paid less?

No. It simply means that USWNT players who choose to play in the NWSL will now be paid a salary directly from their professional NWSL club. U.S. Soccer will pay the players for USWNT duties. This mirrors the standard approach across the world where salaries for league play are paid by the professional clubs.

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Equal Pay and the U.S. Soccer Federation: FAQ

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1. What is the U.S. Soccer Federation’s (USSF) stance on equal pay for the U.S. Women’s National Team (USWNT)? U.S. Soccer is 100% committed to equal pay for our national team players. That’s our goal, that’s our focus, and that’s how we are going to bring the game forward in the United States.…

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U.S. Soccer president on New CBA agreement a truly historic moment - ESPN Video

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Over the last 18 months, much progress has been made to help close the pay gap between male and female soccer players, but more is still to be done. It's a start that the settlement was $24 million, but it is not near the $67 million that was asked for damages. I'd recommend that sports corporations stop waiting until their players voice their concerns about discrimination and pay inequality. They should actively work to ensure there are no disparities between players and eliminate the chance of this happening again.

The US Soccer Federation (USSF) shared, "We support not only the USWNT but women around the world in their continued fight for equal pay and equal treatment in the workplace." It would benefit other governing sports bodies to follow behind the USSF. As contracts are formed, they should be made in both male and female players' best interests. Yes, these federations make their profits from the abilities of their players, but it doesn't mean female players should be significantly less than males.

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U.S. Soccer president: New CBA agreement a truly historic moment - ESPN Video

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U.S. Soccer president Cindy Parlow Cone explains the details of the new CBAs for the USMNT and USWNT.

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Hi Alay’na,
I enjoyed your presentation. It was very detailed and you gave great examples of supporting information. I agree with you recommendations. I believe that in order for us to achieve equal in all sectors. All advocates and supporting individuals have to take action. I believe that if we apply pressure such as this law suit did then we will get closer to our goal. As far as team leaders taking a stand, I think we also have to understand that most of these teams are ran by women. For us to advance and have more advocacy from team leaders, there needs to be a program that help women become owners and coaches. If there is more diversity in these position, I believe we can make a statement.