# US Soccer: "Our Proposal for Equal Pay for Women & Men"



## MWN (Mar 7, 2020)

*Our Proposal for Equal Pay for Women and Men National Team Players - March 7, 2020 *

Dear Friends, Colleagues and Supporters of U.S. Soccer,

We want to update you about our ongoing efforts to chart a new path forward with our Women's National Team (WNT) regarding equal pay.

U.S. Soccer has long been committed to fair and equitable compensation, regardless of gender. While the Men's National Team (MNT) and WNT contracts are indeed different, these compensation models are a result of good-faith bargaining with two separate unions, each with different goals when they negotiated their agreements.

Last month, we offered the WNT Players Association multiple contract options, which we strongly believe address the team's goals as they have been presented to us by the players and their representatives. In particular, we have offered to provide identical compensation to our women's and men's players for all matches controlled by U.S. Soccer.

Since extending this offer, we have made multiple attempts to meet with the WNT to discuss these new options. So far, they have repeatedly declined our invitation to meet on the premise that our proposal does not include U.S. Soccer agreeing to make up the difference in future prize money awarded by FIFA for the Men's and Women's World Cups, a number that would be more than $34 million today. In addition, they are seeking more than $66 million dollars, which is the difference in prize money between the last two FIFA Men's and Women's World Cups.

We want to take this opportunity to again note that the FIFA World Cup prize money at issue is determined by FIFA, not U.S. Soccer.

As a non-profit, member-based organization, U.S. Soccer has obligations to all of our members-including 22 national teams, 113 members across the country and millions of players, coaches and referees at all levels-and we have a responsibility to help all of our members grow. There is indeed a significant difference in World Cup prize money awarded by FIFA to the men's and women's championship teams. However, it is not reasonable or fiscally sound for U.S. Soccer to make up the gap. It would seriously impair our ability to support our mission and invest in these other critical developmental areas.

As we have in the past, U.S. Soccer will continue to be a tireless advocate for the expansion of women's soccer at home and abroad. This will require a concerted effort by all parties to increase investment, competitions and prize money.

At the same time, our proposal to provide identical compensation to our MNT and WNT for all matches controlled by U.S. Soccer remains on the table. We remain hopeful that the players and representatives of the WNT will accept our offer to meet for a productive dialogue.

We will be sure to keep you updated as we do everything we can to resolve this lawsuit in the best interests of everyone involved, including all members of our Federation.

Sincerely,
Carlos Cordeiro
President


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## MWN (Mar 7, 2020)

The claim is that US Soccer offered "identical compensation" to the Men and Women, why didn't the women take the offer?


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## Messi>CR7 (Mar 7, 2020)

MWN said:


> The claim is that US Soccer offered "identical compensation" to the Men and Women, why didn't the women take the offer?


The women had a much better year than the men.


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## Soccerfan2 (Mar 7, 2020)

US Soccer has obviously not long been committed to fair and equitable compensation. That is not a good faith statement.

Additionally, US soccer is sitting on $130 million cash reserves (FIFA on $2.7 BILLION) and the women are the primary drivers of market growth over the past 5 years. 

I do hope Cordeiro proves to be the “tireless advocate for the expansion of women’s soccer at home and abroad” that he claims. It sure seems like he is passing on his first big opportunity.


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## watfly (Mar 9, 2020)

MWN said:


> The claim is that US Soccer offered "identical compensation" to the Men and Women, why didn't the women take the offer?


Unfortunately, US Soccer has lost all benefit of the doubt with most soccer people so I'm skeptical of it being actual "identical compensation".  The fact is none of us know, but very few trust US Soccer based on its track record.  It might be an identical percentage of World Cup revenues, which doesn't equate to identical compensation (not weighing in on whether identical $ compensation is warranted).  While not denying that FIFA's pay structure is a legitimate fact, of many facts in this issue, US Soccer can't just use FIFA as a scapegoat.  Of the sponsorship dollars that US Soccer receives I can't imagine the bulk of those $ are being driven by the men's team.  I have to believe the women provide much more exposure for US Soccer than the men.  Anecdotally, I see way more commercials with US women players than men, in fact I can't recall a recent commercial with a US men's player...maybe Pulisic.

I'm normally skeptical of gender equity pay claims.  However, in this case I think the women have a huge PR advantage in this one because of their relative results on the field. Although when I've seen the women (mostly Rapinoe) interviewed regarding their claim they don't do the best job articulating their position.  At the end of the day, individual facts may not matter in this case particularly if it goes to trial.  Both sides will provide their "hired gun" experts that will contradict and cancel each other and the jury will likely be more sympathetic to the women.


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## Keepermom2 (Mar 10, 2020)

MWN said:


> The claim is that US Soccer offered "identical compensation" to the Men and Women, why didn't the women take the offer?


They have not made an offer to compensate for their past wrongs.  This is a class action lawsuit so the promise for the future is only one piece of the pie.  In addition, making the offer the night before the women's game against Spain doesn't appear to be an attempt in good faith negotiations.

Washington Post November 12, 2019- "For years, the USWNT has made less money for more and better work and has been treated worse for it. A judge has recognized that. Next, a jury can make the federation accountable for it — with back pay and punitive rewards for every little slight and baked-in sexist assumption inflicted on every individual in the entire class of plaintiffs, which includes any woman who has been called up to a training camp since 2015. If the federation was smart, which it isn’t, it would recognize the size of the bill about to come due. "

"Even more significantly, the judge flatly rejected the federation’s main legal defense on the pay disparity issue as “absurd.” And the jury trial doesn’t even start until May 5. "

"What is likely to rile a jury just as much are the crummy little details of their treatment claimed in the suit. In 2017, the men’s team was pampered with charter flights on 17 occasions. It did not charter-fly the women’s team even once. Players consider charter flights a major reprieve and factor in physical recovery, as they allow for more rest before and after games, with no long waits or missed connections in airports. This injury, the judge noted, “is concrete.”

*From Guardian July 2019*

"Before getting into the revenue arguments, it’s worth considering whether revenue should matter at all.

Both US Soccer and Fifa are not-for-profit organizations with stated missions to grow soccer in the US and globally, respectively. Their benchmarks of success are not profits. Rather, they aim to get more people playing, watching and caring about the sport. That requires a lot of investment, which is the opposite of chasing short-term profits.

Without investment (or, in other words, losing money), there’s no way for women’s soccer to grow. After all, men’s soccer has at least a hundred-year head start on the women’s version of the game. Women’s soccer was banned in England, the country that invented the modern game, until 1971. Other countries also banned it, including Brazil until 1981 and Germany until 1970. The question is whether non-profit organizations should ignore their mission of growing the women’s game because it doesn’t have as robust of a foundation as men’s soccer.

Fifa, by the way, has cash reserves of $2.8bn. US Soccer reportedly has a surplus of $150m."

Isn't the biggest potential for growth of the game in women's soccer?


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## Soccerhelper (Mar 10, 2020)

This will not go to trial.  95% of lawsuits get settled behind closed doors.  My buddy told me about the process.  Big time lawyers (really good at negotiating) get together with both parties in separate rooms and they get a deal done.  The job of the lawyers is to make you sweat it out and drain your brain and then make you cave to take pennies or give pennies, depending on if the plaintiff has any value to their claims.  It;s the system we live in.  Once depositions get started and you get folks under oath, it's game on.  That's how each side determines what the actual value they have in the case.  Again, the truth lies in the middle and no case is 100%.  I see this about 98% for the woman.  Carlos is clueless.  This process is brutal though. Lawyers peal your skin back through "salt tactics" and look for traps and lies.  Video camera and the good book to swear on to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God." We should also all consider how much all these WNT players, present and past, have sacrificed their time and bodies through hard work and determination.  Most of the past players made hardly any money.  They had to go find coaching jobs if they wanted to stay in the game they loved.  What about our DDs and our grand daughters?  "The country is watching" what US Soccer and the Federation are up to and 98% of us what some radical change.  The 2% or so (I'm just making this # up) have all the power and control (all the money) and when you have all the money you have all the power. When you have the power, you get to make the rules as you see fit and or a new way to make a few bucks too. It's time to share the real loot with the girls at the top and separate the sheep among the goats.  $250,000 for Docs to bring their top players over?????Then, if a sheep or a sheep team wants to be a goat or a goat team, they have to beat the goats out and then they can move up.  Time to stop all the sheep hiding among the goats. Let me be clear, maybe my goat is a sheep?  I'm open to that possibility and will shake the goat dad's hands (fist pump) proudly and wish his family success and his dd success in da pros and YNT or whatever country they end up playing for.  Goats need to play with other goats.  Then pure goat cream will rise to the top.  It's quite simple really if your willing to go head to head in competition.  Not a juggling act or go through cones skills test at TC center, but a fierce competition (scrimmage) for bragging rights on the actual game being played.


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## pulguita (Mar 10, 2020)

Sorry,  but US Soccer should not and has no obligation to pay the difference between the FIFA award for the Women's World Cup and the Men's World Cup.   That is the issue.  If the women are being offered the same deal as the men why are they not accepting it?    2 entirely different competitions, 2 different profit structures.  If the women think they are entitled to the same money go talk to FIFA otherwise go try out for the MNT. Where I work a women gets paid the same as me for doing the same work.  The WWC and the MWC are NOT the same work.  They also don't bring in the  same revenue.


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## Soccerhelper (Mar 10, 2020)

The woman are the one's who help the little girls sign up and then the parents spend $10K a yea or more.  The woman are the ones who are winning. I could care a less about MNT.  They suck!!!  No wins bro.  No world cup last time either.  MLS is a joke. I was at great park last night and a saw this red team practicing.  All red.  My gosh.........Please!!!  Pay the girls now!!!!!  Plus, 80% of the one's who don;t make it quit because asshole men are screaming and yelling at them all the time and telling them who they should be when their 7.  They quit at 16 or quit as freshman in college.  Only a very few find success.  Many of these girls face depression and feel like a failure all because some dudes are trying to get rich.  Fix it now!!!!


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## Keepermom2 (Mar 10, 2020)

pulguita said:


> Sorry,  but US Soccer should not and has no obligation to pay the difference between the FIFA award for the Women's World Cup and the Men's World Cup.   That is the issue.  If the women are being offered the same deal as the men why are they not accepting it?    2 entirely different competitions, 2 different profit structures.  If the women think they are entitled to the same money go talk to FIFA otherwise go try out for the MNT. Where I work a women gets paid the same as me for doing the same work.  The WWC and the MWC are NOT the same work.  They also don't bring in the  same revenue.


Actually US Soccer has only offered equal pay for the future and not reimbursement for the equal pay and treatment that should have happened for the past excluding the issue with FIFA not paying equal payment for World Cup wins.  I presume the FIFA portion of the their request will be thrown out at some point.  I think it is there for shock value that will help them get damages for the valid complaints of unequal payment and treatment over the past years.


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## sweeperkeeper (Mar 11, 2020)

Keepermom2 said:


> Actually US Soccer has only offered equal pay for the future and not reimbursement for the equal pay and treatment that should have happened for the past excluding the issue with FIFA not paying equal payment for World Cup wins.  I presume the FIFA portion of the their request will be thrown out at some point.  I think it is there for shock value that will help them get damages for the valid complaints of unequal payment and treatment over the past years.


You realize that the difference from FIFA and the World Cup is that the men's tournament generates significantly more revenue than the women's.  The high level numbers I have seen, the men's tournament generates 4 times the viewership than the women.

Is someone going to start saying that softball players should be paid the same as baseball players? What about the fact that the WNT loses to most boys academy U-17 teams?  Should those U-17 players be paid the same as the women?

In the end, sports is all about entertainment and getting dollars for people to watch athletes do an activity.  This is true in every sport. 

I have no idea how to make this equitable....  You either pay them the same in dollar terms which means the men are subsidizing the women or you do it on revenue and the women get less and we are back to square 1.


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## MWN (Mar 11, 2020)

sweeperkeeper said:


> You realize that the difference from FIFA and the World Cup is that the men's tournament generates significantly more revenue than the women's.  The high level numbers I have seen, the men's tournament generates 4 times the viewership than the women.
> 
> Is someone going to start saying that softball players should be paid the same as baseball players? What about the fact that the WNT loses to most boys academy U-17 teams?  Should those U-17 players be paid the same as the women?
> 
> ...


A few corrections.  The USWNT player's do not scrimmage against U17 boys ... at least not in the last decade ... they would lose to all boys DA 16+ teams (but we will never know because they don't schedule against the olders).  Historically its always been  U14 and U15 DA and ODP.  At U16+, the game is far too fast and the boys "too manly" for the USWNT to gain any value.  In the old days before the DA ... it was always ODP BU14 and BU15 because while these boys were faster, they were still underweight and did little potential damage to the women in collisions.  

Softball v. Baseball - Yes, that is the basic argument, but a weak one because we are talking about the National team, paid by the same employer (so to speak).  The real difference, which seems to fly under the radar is the USWNT are W-2 employees and paid to play in the NWSL per their collective bargain agreement, whereas, the men do not receive a "salary" like the women, but are paid on a per diem/game basis.  What irks me is the women negotiated a deal and now are saying ... "Oh f@#$%, you know that deal we all negotiated under our collective bargaining agreement?  Yaaaa! that one!!!  We don't like it now that we see the men really do men suck compared to internationals and we are awesome, so rather than living by the terms of our agreement, we want to sue and claim unequal treatment (that we negotiated ... oops).

The solution to make this "equal" is really simple and a solution that has been proposed.  Here it is:

Step 1 - USWNT and USMNT are treated as a single team ... One Nation, One Team.
Step 2 - All monies received by either team are put in a single pot.
Step 3 - All players are paid an equal amount based on their participation in camps, games, etc.
Step 4 - The USWNT team deal where the stars are treated as W2 employees for their time in the NWSL ends.
Step 5 - All players, regardless of WNT or MNT are paid an equal percentage of the FIFA prizes.  Thus, the women to well, the men get paid equally.  If the men do well, the women get paid equally.  We apply a pro-rata distribution to the players of both yearly based on a common pool.

The solution above, requires we treat the Men and Women's team as a single team and distribute funds equally. 

The fundamental problem with the above is we are going to lose some of the men who are going to say "F' that, why would I leave my multi-million dollar Chelsea contract to play for a USMNT that won't do shit."  No thanks.  We have to live with this problem and just deal with it and hope our men international put country over dollars/euros/pounds.


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## Keepermom2 (Mar 11, 2020)

sweeperkeeper said:


> You realize that the difference from FIFA and the World Cup is that the men's tournament generates significantly more revenue than the women's.  The high level numbers I have seen, the men's tournament generates 4 times the viewership than the women.
> 
> Is someone going to start saying that softball players should be paid the same as baseball players? What about the fact that the WNT loses to most boys academy U-17 teams?  Should those U-17 players be paid the same as the women?
> 
> ...


Yeah I don't see how they have a leg to stand on with FIFA bonuses and asking US to make up the difference.  Doesn't make sense to me but would it make sense to a jury?

Speaking of the entertainment factor...the women's US ticket sales exceeded the men's ticket sales  for games played in the US and;

"On Sunday, a crowd of nearly 60,000 people gathered at France’s Parc Olympique Lyonnais to watch as the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team (USWNT) defeated the Netherlands 2-0 in the 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup Final. Back in the U.S., millions more were watching. According to a statement from Fox Sports, citing data from Nielsen, approximately 14.3 million U.S. viewers tuned in to the final match on television, compared to 11.4 million for the 2018 Men’s World Cup Final, a 22% U.S. viewership boost.  Fox Sports’ statement reports that total viewership, including online streaming, peaked at roughly 20 million, making it the most-watched soccer match on English-language television, men’s or women’s, in the U.S. since the 2015 FIFA Women’s World Cup final, which delivered 25.4 million viewers."

I guess people find them more entertaining. I am pretty sure the above information is why the women's team didn't feel their original employment agreement was appropriate.

As I previously posted, FIFA and US Soccer are non profit organizations with their purpose being to grow the game and viewership not maximize profits.

So your arguments/examples are not only trying to match apples to oranges but, equate to men deserve more money than the women because women are the weaker sex.  The 60's must have been good years for you.  LOL  Insert my theme song by Helen Reddy. hahaha


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## Soccerhelper (Mar 12, 2020)

"On behalf of U.S. Soccer, I sincerely apologize for the offense and pain caused by language in this week's court filing, which did not reflect the values of our Federation or our tremendous admiration of our Women's National Team," Cordeiro said in the statement. "Our WNT players are incredibly talented and work tirelessly, as they have demonstrated time and again from their Olympic Gold medals to their World Cup titles."  Carlos-

Well, it's a start........


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## Soccerhelper (Mar 12, 2020)

Please, please protect all the girls from monsters in soccer









						Kukors Smith Settles Lawsuit With USA Swimming, Hutchison
					

Olympian Ariana Kukors Smith has settled her lawsuit against USA Swimming over sexual abuse she says she suffered at the hands of former coach Sean Hutchison.




					swimswam.com


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## Soccerhelper (Mar 12, 2020)

Keepermom2 said:


> He and/or US Soccer needs a new PR leader or group.   Issuing their proposed deal the night before they had a scheduled game with Spain makes them look like....


These guys don;t give diddly squat for our DDs

What does the phrase diddly squat mean?
The original form (from the 1930s) is *doodly*-*squat*. *Doodly* is hypothesised to *mean* either worthless (from doodle) or excrement (from *do* one's *do*, which sounds implausible). *Squat* is used as an intensifier and is probably a euphemism (both in sound and *meaning*) for shit


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## Dos Equis (Mar 12, 2020)

Soccerhelper said:


> "On behalf of U.S. Soccer, I sincerely apologize for the offense and pain caused by language in this week's court filing, which did not reflect the values of our Federation or our tremendous admiration of our Women's National Team," Cordeiro said in the statement. "Our WNT players are incredibly talented and work tirelessly, as they have demonstrated time and again from their Olympic Gold medals to their World Cup titles."  Carlos-
> 
> Well, it's a start........


It  should be the end of US Soccer as we know it.

As someone who was conflicted on this issue, given the obvious differences in the two games and global markets, US Soccer's legal filings have put me firmly in the player's camp.  US Soccer's current leadership has once again failed, and the obvious bias and sexism in their legal documents warrants radical change in how this team and our sport is managed at the National level.  I was even agreeing with Megan Rapinoe yesterday, who showed more class in her post-game response than US Soccer. Watching Julie Foudy react to the disclosure and apology in real time was devastating. 

At this point, silence is not acceptable, and I would call on the men's players to express their outrage at US Soccer's legal claims, and support the women's team through not just public statements, but even boycotts of playing for US Soccer under its current leadership.  If you are going to be offended by people who look the other way when they know they are working for awful people/organizations, I put agreeing to be part of the USMNT without demanding a change in leadership in the same category.


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## Keepermom2 (Mar 12, 2020)

U.S. Soccer stated that "it is undisputed that the job of [Men's National Team] player requires materially more strength and speed than the job of [Women's National Team] player." It also added that "the job of MNT players carries more responsibility than the job of a WNT player." 

Holy cow was that dumb!  That argument equates to women are the weaker sex and therefore should be paid less.  I think the folks that decided that was a good argument need to join the millennium.


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## Kicker4Life (Mar 12, 2020)

Dos Equis said:


> It  should be the end of US Soccer as we know it.
> 
> As someone who was conflicted on this issue, given the obvious differences in the two games and global markets, US Soccer's legal filings have put me firmly in the player's camp.  US Soccer's current leadership has once again failed, and the obvious bias and sexism in their legal documents warrants radical change in how this team and our sport is managed at the National level.  I was even agreeing with Megan Rapinoe yesterday, who showed more class in her post-game response than US Soccer. Watching Julie Foudy react to the disclosure and apology in real time was devastating.
> 
> At this point, silence is not acceptable, and I would call on the men's players to express their outrage at US Soccer's legal claims, and support the women's team through not just public statements, but even boycotts of playing for US Soccer under its current leadership.  If you are going to be offended by people who look the other way when they know they are working for awful people/organizations, I put agreeing to be part of the USMNT without demanding a change in leadership in the same category.


Agree 100%


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## outside! (Mar 12, 2020)

Soccerhelper said:


> "On behalf of U.S. Soccer, I sincerely apologize for the offense and pain caused by language in this week's court filing, which did not reflect the values of our Federation or our tremendous admiration of our Women's National Team," Cordeiro said in the statement. "Our WNT players are incredibly talented and work tirelessly, as they have demonstrated time and again from their Olympic Gold medals to their World Cup titles."  Carlos-
> 
> Well, it's a start........


No it's not. It is Carlos trying to cover his ass. The real solution would be to disband US Soccer and start fresh and while they are at it move the headquarters from the soccer hellhole that is Chicago.


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## Soccerfan2 (Mar 12, 2020)

The image of the ladies in their inside out jerseys yesterday says it all.


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## Keepermom2 (Mar 12, 2020)

Dos Equis said:


> It  should be the end of US Soccer as we know it.
> 
> As someone who was conflicted on this issue, given the obvious differences in the two games and global markets, US Soccer's legal filings have put me firmly in the player's camp.  US Soccer's current leadership has once again failed, and the obvious bias and sexism in their legal documents warrants radical change in how this team and our sport is managed at the National level.  I was even agreeing with Megan Rapinoe yesterday, who showed more class in her post-game response than US Soccer. Watching Julie Foudy react to the disclosure and apology in real time was devastating.
> 
> At this point, silence is not acceptable, and I would call on the men's players to express their outrage at US Soccer's legal claims, and support the women's team through not just public statements, but even boycotts of playing for US Soccer under its current leadership.  If you are going to be offended by people who look the other way when they know they are working for awful people/organizations, I put agreeing to be part of the USMNT without demanding a change in leadership in the same category.


Well said...I too have been conflicted for the same reasons until I read the purpose of US Soccer and FIFA's is to grow the game.  I had always looked at it from a profit stand point.  While that is still somewhat important because you need revenue to be able to spend on growing the game, there has been incredible growth in women's soccer in the US and in the world which is largely because of the US women's national team success.


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## outside! (Mar 12, 2020)

Keepermom2 said:


> Well said...I too have been conflicted for the same reasons until I read the purpose of US Soccer and FIFA's is to grow the game.  I had always looked at it from a profit stand point.  While that is still somewhat important because you need revenue to be able to spend on growing the game, there has been incredible growth in women's soccer in the US and in the world which is largely because of the US women's national team success.


I was not conflicted and I was looking at it from a profit point of view, long term profits. The best way to continue to grow the sport for men is to fund the women. Mothers on average make more decisions about how children spend their days than fathers do. Women soccer players and fans will be more likely to introduce their young children to soccer than non players/fans.


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## Keepermom2 (Mar 12, 2020)

outside! said:


> I was not conflicted and I was looking at it from a profit point of view, long term profits. The best way to continue to grow the sport for men is to fund the women. Mothers on average make more decisions about how children spend their days than fathers do. Women soccer players and fans will be more likely to introduce their young children to soccer than non players/fans.


Very good point!


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## Keepermom2 (Mar 12, 2020)

A long-term partner of U.S. Soccer, Coke said in a statement Wednesday that it was “extremely disappointed with the unacceptable and offensive comments.  We have asked to meet with them immediately to express our concerns,” the company said. “The Coca-Cola Co. is firm in its commitment to gender equality, fairness and women’s empowerment in the United States and around the world, and we expect the same from our partners.”

I am guessing the revenue argument will now be off the table.









						U.S. Soccer hits rock bottom with shameful legal argument against USWNT
					

In a filing, a lawyer for U.S. Soccer made the argument that women’s players were inferior to men. There’s no coming back from there.




					ftw.usatoday.com


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## sweeperkeeper (Mar 12, 2020)

Keepermom2 said:


> Yeah I don't see how they have a leg to stand on with FIFA bonuses and asking US to make up the difference.  Doesn't make sense to me but would it make sense to a jury?
> 
> Speaking of the entertainment factor...the women's US ticket sales exceeded the men's ticket sales  for games played in the US and;
> 
> ...


You are cherry picking data.  Look at world wide viewership of the world cup finals not just US numbers.  Then look at revenue for the entire sport.  There were 3-4 times the viewership for the mens world cup than the womens.  

I'm not saying that the men deserve more or less. I actually think they should be paid the same base rate (something like 100K per year) but then the question goes back to the fact that the men's game generates significantly more revenue world wide (mostly from FIFA television rights) which gets funneled through the various team.

My point is that many of the arguments for the WNT pay increase revolve around their performance and how well they have done.  That is great but then you need to look at that sport (womens soccer) separate than mens soccer. It is no different than mens baseball vs womens softball.


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## Keepermom2 (Mar 12, 2020)

A long-term partner of U.S. Soccer, Coke said in a statement Wednesday that it was “extremely disappointed with the unacceptable and offensive comments


sweeperkeeper said:


> You are cherry picking data.  Look at world wide viewership of the world cup finals not just US numbers.  Then look at revenue for the entire sport.  There were 3-4 times the viewership for the mens world cup than the womens.
> 
> I'm not saying that the men deserve more or less. I actually think they should be paid the same base rate (something like 100K per year) but then the question goes back to the fact that the men's game generates significantly more revenue world wide (mostly from FIFA television rights) which gets funneled through the various team.
> 
> My point is that many of the arguments for the WNT pay increase revolve around their performance and how well they have done.  That is great but then you need to look at that sport (womens soccer) separate than mens soccer. It is no different than mens baseball vs womens softball.


We are talking about US Soccer not world wide soccer.  You should probably update yourself on the latest happenings in the legal argument.  US Soccer is at risk for losing revenue from sponsors for both men and women for making the same argument in essence that you are making.  Note it IS different than men's baseball vs women's softball because they are not under the same organization or being paid by the same organization.


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## Dos Equis (Mar 12, 2020)

outside! said:


> I was not conflicted and I was looking at it from a profit point of view, long term profits. The best way to continue to grow the sport for men is to fund the women. Mothers on average make more decisions about how children spend their days than fathers do. Women soccer players and fans will be more likely to introduce their young children to soccer than non players/fans.


My conflict had nothing to do with profits but more to do with investment.  I was concerned the women were looking too much at current pay versus long term investment in the overall women's game by US Soccer.  The support of the NWSL and their salaries and benefits for playing there is a unique situation, and while modification and expansion of that investment was needed, elimination of that support in exchange for higher compensation for current players was, in my estimation, a gamble I was not willing to support.

However, US Soccer abandoned that argument/strategy for straight out sexism.  Less responsibility?  Our women's team carried the torch and was (and in large part still is) the global face for the entire women's soccer game for over 20 years. The girls youth game develop in these years as a direct result of our women's teams accomplishments and efforts.  That includes the dark days, post the collapse of the first woman's professional league, when our WNT was not year round and the women were sustaining the game by paying to play, playing for free, or fundraising and running camps and clinics so the WPSL and other adult leagues could keep going.

US Soccer just does not get it.  This debacle.  The rushed roll out and now slow decline of the girls DA everywhere but in Socal. I could go on, but in the end, women's soccer needs better stewardship than US Soccer has shown it can provide.


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## Keepermom2 (Mar 12, 2020)

Keepermom2 said:


> A long-term partner of U.S. Soccer, Coke said in a statement Wednesday that it was “extremely disappointed with the unacceptable and offensive comments
> 
> 
> We are talking about US Soccer not world wide soccer.  You should probably update yourself on the latest happenings in the legal argument.  US Soccer is at risk for losing revenue from sponsors for both men and women for making the same argument in essence that you are making.  Note it IS different than men's baseball vs women's softball because they are not under the same organization or being paid by the same organization.


And...not cherry picking at all.   
*FIFA: Over 1 Billion People Watched 2019 Women's World Cup  *That includes an average audience of 82.18 million in-home viewers for the USA-Netherlands final. FIFA research says the Women's World Cup final drew an average audience of 82.18 million in-home viewers - 56% more than the 2015 final.  FIFA says the United States' 2-0 win over the Netherlands in Lyon, France, reached 263.62 million viewers for at least one minute of action.









						FIFA: Over 1 Billion Watched 2019 Women's World Cup
					

The numbers were big all summer long–especially in the USA-Netherlands final.




					www.si.com


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## pulguita (Mar 12, 2020)

Keepermom2 said:


> And...not cherry picking at all.
> *FIFA: Over 1 Billion People Watched 2019 Women's World Cup  *That includes an average audience of 82.18 million in-home viewers for the USA-Netherlands final. FIFA research says the Women's World Cup final drew an average audience of 82.18 million in-home viewers - 56% more than the 2015 final.  FIFA says the United States' 2-0 win over the Netherlands in Lyon, France, reached 263.62 million viewers for at least one minute of action.
> 
> 
> ...


Over 3.572 billion watched the men's 2018 World Cup and over 1.12 billion watched the final alone.  What is your point?


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## Keepermom2 (Mar 12, 2020)

Dos Equis said:


> My conflict had nothing to do with profits but more to do with investment.  I was concerned the women were looking too much at current pay versus long term investment in the overall women's game by US Soccer.  The support of the NWSL and their salaries and benefits for playing there is a unique situation, and while modification and expansion of that investment was needed, elimination of that support in exchange for higher compensation for current players was, in my estimation, a gamble I was not willing to support.
> 
> However, US Soccer abandoned that argument/strategy for straight out sexism.  Less responsibility?  Our women's team carried the torch and was (and in large part still is) the global face for the entire women's soccer game for over 20 years. The girls youth game develop in these years as a direct result of our women's teams accomplishments and efforts.  That includes the dark days, post the collapse of the first woman's professional league, when our WNT was not year round and the women were sustaining the game by paying to play, playing for free, or fundraising and running camps and clinics so the WPSL and other adult leagues could keep going.
> 
> US Soccer just does not get it.  This debacle.  The rushed roll out and now slow decline of the girls DA everywhere but in Socal. I could go on, but in the end, women's soccer needs better stewardship than US Soccer has shown it can provide.


Great post.   I was also struggling with the "current pay versus long term investment".  Ideally I would like to see the settlement agreement include equal pay, payment for damages (I am not necessarily in agreement on the FIFA bonus discrepancy the way it is currently stated), and an additional investment that includes growing the women's soccer program here in the US beyond what they currently have planned.


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## Keepermom2 (Mar 12, 2020)

pulguita said:


> Over 3.572 billion watched the men's 2018 World Cup and over 1.12 billion watched the final alone.  What is your point?


The growth in the women's game worldwide.


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## MWN (Mar 12, 2020)

sweeperkeeper said:


> You are cherry picking data.  Look at world wide viewership of the world cup finals not just US numbers.  Then look at revenue for the entire sport.  There were 3-4 times the viewership for the mens world cup than the womens.
> 
> I'm not saying that the men deserve more or less. I actually think they should be paid the same base rate (something like 100K per year) but then the question goes back to the fact that the men's game generates significantly more revenue world wide (mostly from FIFA television rights) which gets funneled through the various team.
> 
> My point is that many of the arguments for the WNT pay increase revolve around their performance and how well they have done.  That is great but then you need to look at that sport (womens soccer) separate than mens soccer. It is no different than mens baseball vs womens softball.


The first step is to understand the current differences in pay.  The women are paid "guaranteed" amounts, whereas the men are not paid any guaranteed amounts.  As a result, the men get paid more for meeting certain milestones, whereas the women are paid less.  


MEN (Per Collective Bargain)WOMEN (Per Collective Bargain)SALARY (National Team Contract) 17 Players (16 in 2021)$0.00 (No US Soccer Salary)*$100,000*MLS/NWSL Bonus by US Soccer$0.00 (No US Soccer Bonus)*$67,500* (Tier 1)
*$62,500* (Tier 2)Call Ups  - Non Contract Players$3,500 - $4,000 per call-up (8+ Camps)$3,500 - $4,000 per call-up (8+ Camps)World Cup Roster Bonus*$68,750.00*$37,500Win Against Non Top Teams*$9,375 *(Outside Top 25)$5,250 (Outside Top 8)Loss Against Non Top Team*$5,000*$0.00Game Attendance $ per ticket$1.50 to Union*$1.50 + 7.5%* to Union above 17,000 txs.Game Sold OutNo Bonus*Bonus*Viewership BonusNo Bonus*Bonus *(if increase 10+%)

_Source: https://www.espn.com/soccer/united-states-usaw/story/4071258/uswnt-lawsuit-versus-us-soccer-explained-defining-the-pay-gapswhats-at-stake-for-both-sides_

It is absolutely true that the USWNT players not paid *equally*. This is because they negotiated a guaranteed deal, which guarantees pay of $167,500 for 17 of them, and $62,500 for the remaining 7, whereas the USMNT soccer players receive $0 in guaranteed pay.

My question to all of you is based on the fact that the Women negotiated guaranteed pay and the men don't get any, why do you believe that US Soccer is treating them unfairly?


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## Ellejustus (Mar 12, 2020)

Carlos Cordeiro, the U.S. Soccer president who presided over a disgraceful legal strategy citing “science” to belittle the world champion U.S. women’s national team based on its gender, should resign immediately.  
There is no other conclusion that can be reached after the federation showed shockingly poor judgment approving official language from U.S. Soccer,
U.S. Soccer has had a long history of discriminating against its women’s players, a story that SI told in detail in last year’s podcast series THROWBACK about the U.S. women’s national team. But never before this week had that discrimination been put into writing so brazenly by the federation itself. In documents released to the public, presumably after significant vetting from U.S. Soccer, the federation argued that women’s players deserved to be paid less than men’s players because their ability and skill were not as good as those of men’s players if they competed against each other on the field.


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## pulguita (Mar 12, 2020)

MWN said:


> The first step is to understand the current differences in pay.  The women are paid "guaranteed" amounts, whereas the men are not paid any guaranteed amounts.  As a result, the men get paid more for meeting certain milestones, whereas the women are paid less.
> 
> 
> MEN (Per Collective Bargain)WOMEN (Per Collective Bargain)SALARY (National Team Contract) 17 Players (16 in 2021)$0.00 (No US Soccer Salary)*$100,000*MLS/NWSL Bonus by US Soccer$0.00 (No US Soccer Bonus)*$67,500* (Tier 1)
> ...


Thank you for illuminating this.  So the $66 million comes down to this - the women want equal WC pay and want US Soccer to pay the difference to what FIFA pays out.   They clearly have a better deal already than the US men.  As I and many have said, it is profit driven - the men's tournament generates far more revenue than does the women's.  The only possible beef could be with FIFA and are they paying an equal percentage of the award's pot to both men and women winners?  Other than that I would tell them to go pound sand.  It's not US Soccer's responsibility to make up the difference.


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## outside! (Mar 12, 2020)

Dos Equis said:


> US Soccer just does not get it.  This debacle.  The rushed roll out and now slow decline of the girls DA everywhere but in Socal. I could go on, but in the end, women's soccer needs better stewardship than US Soccer has shown it can provide.


As someone said above, great post. I feel like a rec player practicing with a D1 team. You write really well.

The only thing I would change about your post is that all soccer in the US, men's and women's needs better stewardship than US soccer can provide.


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## outside! (Mar 12, 2020)

pulguita said:


> Thank you for illuminating this.  So the $66 million comes down to this - the women want equal WC pay and want US Soccer to pay the difference to what FIFA pays out.   They clearly have a better deal already than the US men.  As I and many have said, it is profit driven - the men's tournament generates far more revenue than does the women's.  The only possible beef could be with FIFA and are they paying an equal percentage of the award's pot to both men and women winners?  Other than that I would tell them to go pound sand.  It's not US Soccer's responsibility to make up the difference.


So your solution to a century or more of blatant discrimination that effects all female players is to do nothing?


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## pulguita (Mar 12, 2020)

outside! said:


> So your solution to a century or more of blatant discrimination that effects all female players is to do nothing?


Please tell me how the current deal with US  Soccer discriminates against women?   They made the deal.   So are you telling me FIFA should pay the women the same amount as the men even though they don't produce the same revenue.


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## MWN (Mar 12, 2020)

Ellejustus said:


> Carlos Cordeiro, the U.S. Soccer president who presided over a disgraceful legal strategy citing “science” to belittle the world champion U.S. women’s national team based on its gender, should resign immediately.
> There is no other conclusion that can be reached after the federation showed shockingly poor judgment approving official language from U.S. Soccer,
> U.S. Soccer has had a long history of discriminating against its women’s players, a story that SI told in detail in last year’s podcast series THROWBACK about the U.S. women’s national team. But never before this week had that discrimination been put into writing so brazenly by the federation itself. In documents released to the public, presumably after significant vetting from U.S. Soccer, the federation argued that women’s players deserved to be paid less than men’s players because their ability and skill were not as good as those of men’s players if they competed against each other on the field.


It would be highly unlikely that the legal filings were vetted by US Soccer Executives or their PR Team.  In litigation of this nature, those with advanced notice of legal strategy tends to be a very small circle.  Because these legal filings were made by an outside firm, the normal practice is for outside counsel to share the filings with "in house counsel" before filing.  In house counsel would not share the filings with anybody not on the "closed" legal committee and then its rare to do so for a summary judgment motion.  What US Soccer's lawyer's argue is based on existing law, thus, legal strategies and not PR strategies, so "assuming" or "presuming significant vettings from US Soccer" would be highly unlikely.  Also note that this are responsive pleadings (Opposition or Reply Papers), which means they needed to be filed and served 21 days before the hearing date.  

Here is a link to the Opposition papers:





						DocumentCloud
					






					www.documentcloud.org
				




The arguments made by counsel that are the inflammatory arguments start on page 11 (Sub.Section C - WNT and MNT Players Do Not Perform Equal Work Requiring Equal Skill, Effort, and Responsibility Under Similar Working Conditions." 

However, reading the full context of the argument is much less to not inflammatory (IMHO).


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## outside! (Mar 12, 2020)

pulguita said:


> Please tell me how the current deal with US  Soccer discriminates against women?   They made the deal.   So are you telling me FIFA should pay the women the same amount as the men even though they don't produce the same revenue.


Why does the men's game produce more revenue? Is it solely because it is more entertaining? Prior to the 1921 ban on women's football by the FA, some women's matches sold more tickets than men's matches with one drawing 53,000 spectators. The FA ban did not end until 1971. Many other countries banned women's football. Germany's ban did not end until 1980. Without these historical ban's on women's football it is very likely that women's football would generate much more revenue than it does now. So given that the women's game has been discriminated against by many of the core countries of FIFA, your solution is still to do nothing to right these wrongs?


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## Sheriff Joe (Mar 12, 2020)

Didn’t the women sign up for their current deal?
I am sure they all are able to do other jobs.
As long as some of them keep acting up I hope they don’t get squat and with this Red Chinese virus that’s what might happen.
They are a disgrace to our country.








						U.S. Women’s Soccer Team Makes Statement During National Anthem: Hides U.S. Soccer Crest | The Daily Wire
					






					www.dailywire.com


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## MWN (Mar 12, 2020)

outside! said:


> Why does the men's game produce more revenue? Is it solely because it is more entertaining? Prior to the 1921 ban on women's football by the FA, some women's matches sold more tickets than men's matches with one drawing 53,000 spectators. The FA ban did not end until 1971. Many other countries banned women's football. Germany's ban did not end until 1980. Without these historical ban's on women's football it is very likely that women's football would generate much more revenue than it does now. So given that the women's game has been discriminated against by many of the core countries of FIFA, your solution is still to do nothing to right these wrongs?


Revenue has a direct relationship to the popularity of the exhibition match to spectators.  It all comes down to the spectators and their motivations to spend money.  Without appreciating the motivations of the spectators, its easy to make some illogical assumptions.

Hopefully we call all agree that most "Spectators" are primarily motivated to:

Watch "National" teams out of patriotism and pride for the flag.  
Watch "College Sports" because of collegiate allegiance.
Watch "Professional Sports" because of team allegiance AND entertainment value.
Watch "Charitable" Sports because of the charitable purposes.
The problem with pointing to Dick, Kerr Ladies FC, and women's soccer in England after WW-I, is that the team's purpose was to raise money for wounded war veterans.  Whether good football or not, the ticket's sold were all for charity and those that attended were motivated primarily to support the charitable purpose.  This wasn't professional women's football, rather, charitable exhibition matches.

Once we hit the "Professional" level ... paid athletes to entertain, the standard for spectators is raised.  If the player's do not represent the highest standard in that sport, few if any spectators attend (USL Champions, USL-1, USL-2, NWSL, WNBA, WNHL, etc.)


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## Dos Equis (Mar 12, 2020)

outside! said:


> The only thing I would change about your post is that all soccer in the US, men's and women's needs better stewardship than US soccer can provide.


I could not agree more.  It is a pattern -- US Soccer tried to copy the boy's development model for the girls, ignoring the differences.  They try to copy the European development model for the boys/men, again not understanding the shortcomings of that approach in a very different US sports/education/employment market. 

I reached out and tried get more involved a while ago, until I realized how little they wanted any outside involvement. The behavior and statements from US Soccer usually remind me of one of those cliche posters from my childhood -- they are so far behind, they think they are ahead.


MWN said:


> It would be highly unlikely that the legal filings were vetted by US Soccer Executives or their PR Team.  In litigation of this nature, those with advanced notice of legal strategy tends to be a very small circle.  Because these legal filings were made by an outside firm, the normal practice is for outside counsel to share the filings with "in house counsel" before filing.  In house counsel would not share the filings with anybody not on the "closed" legal committee and then its rare to do so for a summary judgment motion.  What US Soccer's lawyer's argue is based on existing law, thus, legal strategies and not PR strategies, so "assuming" or "presuming significant vettings from US Soccer" would be highly unlikely.  Also note that this are responsive pleadings (Opposition or Reply Papers), which means they needed to be filed and served 21 days before the hearing date.
> 
> Here is a link to the Opposition papers:
> 
> ...


A few observations:

1) Having read the legal memorandum, I find several responses offensive and inflammatory (as a man) and cannot begin to comprehend how the women feel.  From a management and PR standpoint, taking their position on unequal skill and responsibility might be legally sound and defensible, but it is not the moral high ground.  Even if US Soccer wins, in the long run, women's soccer loses.  They should realize that.  They are in a fight they cannot win with a scorched earth approach.

1) Given the nature and sensitivity of this lawsuit, there is no excuse for US Soccer senior management to not be part of every response, and fully understand (and own) the arguments and responses being made. For them to possibly delegate this to only the legal team (outside and inside) is just as abhorrent as coming up with the arguments themselves.  The Cordeiro apology was an admission of this.

3) On the "equal responsibility" argument, US Soccer actually takes the position that one of the reasons the US Women do not face the same level of responsibility is that they do not play for the same amount of tournament money (page 13).  Really? That is one heck of a circular argument. Your lack of pay and opportunity results in you having less responsibility?

I could go on with parts of the document that most would find offensive but, as I said, winning the legal argument this way is a loss for everyone involved, including US Soccer.


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## outside! (Mar 12, 2020)

MWN said:


> The problem with pointing to Dick, Kerr Ladies FC, and women's soccer in England after WW-I, is that the team's purpose was to raise money for wounded war veterans.  Whether good football or not, the ticket's sold were all for charity and those that attended were motivated primarily to support the charitable purpose.  This wasn't professional women's football, rather, charitable exhibition matches.


If that is the case and it was all just a flash in the pan, then why did the FA ban women's football? They did it because the women were taking away some of their spectators and revenue. Quotes from the time show that many of the spectators found the games to be very good.

For a number of reasons, the time has come to pay the USWNT the same as the USMNT, including the FIFA bonuses. I believe that doing so will benefit both teams in the long run.


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## watfly (Mar 12, 2020)

MWN said:


> It would be highly unlikely that the legal filings were vetted by US Soccer Executives or their PR Team.  In litigation of this nature, those with advanced notice of legal strategy tends to be a very small circle.  Because these legal filings were made by an outside firm, the normal practice is for outside counsel to share the filings with "in house counsel" before filing.  In house counsel would not share the filings with anybody not on the "closed" legal committee and then its rare to do so for a summary judgment motion.  What US Soccer's lawyer's argue is based on existing law, thus, legal strategies and not PR strategies, so "assuming" or "presuming significant vettings from US Soccer" would be highly unlikely.  Also note that this are responsive pleadings (Opposition or Reply Papers), which means they needed to be filed and served 21 days before the hearing date.


With all do respect that is so misleading.    If the executive(s) of US Soccer didn't review the filings that is gross negligence, at a minimum, on their part.  Executive's should never just give their counsel free reign to say and file what they want.  Furthermore, If the attorney's didn't consider the PR impact of their filings IMO they're guilty of malpractice.  It's also the height of arrogance for an attorney not to get a blessing from the company's executive(s) on legal filings.  This is what happens when you use "legal" attorneys instead of "business" attorneys.  Legal attorneys get bogged down in the minutia of the law and only see things through the eye of the law,  whereas, "business" attorneys can balance both the business considerations with legal considerations.

As I mentioned before, the facts are going to be very convoluted in this case and both sides will present very convincing and qualified experts that will completely contradict each other.  PR is going to be critical in this matter and likely have a very persuasive impact on a settlement or on a jury.  The fact that Carlos and US Soccer don't recognize that is just another example of their mind-numbing incompetence.



Dos Equis said:


> It  should be the end of US Soccer as we know it.
> 
> As someone who was conflicted on this issue, given the obvious differences in the two games and global markets, US Soccer's legal filings have put me firmly in the player's camp.  US Soccer's current leadership has once again failed, and the obvious bias and sexism in their legal documents warrants radical change in how this team and our sport is managed at the National level.  I was even agreeing with Megan Rapinoe yesterday, who showed more class in her post-game response than US Soccer. Watching Julie Foudy react to the disclosure and apology in real time was devastating.
> 
> At this point, silence is not acceptable, and I would call on the men's players to express their outrage at US Soccer's legal claims, and support the women's team through not just public statements, but even boycotts of playing for US Soccer under its current leadership.  If you are going to be offended by people who look the other way when they know they are working for awful people/organizations, I put agreeing to be part of the USMNT without demanding a change in leadership in the same category.


100%.  Very well said.


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## MWN (Mar 12, 2020)

watfly said:


> With all do respect that is so misleading.    If the executive(s) of US Soccer didn't review the filings that is gross negligence, at a minimum, on their part.  Executive's should never just give their counsel free reign to say and file what they want.  Furthermore, If the attorney's didn't consider the PR impact of their filings IMO they're guilty of malpractice.  It's also the height of arrogance for an attorney not to get a blessing from the company's executive(s) on legal filings.  This is what happens when you use "legal" attorneys instead of "business" attorneys.  Legal attorneys get bogged down in the minutia of the law and only see things through the eye of the law,  whereas, "business" attorneys can balance both the business considerations with legal considerations.
> 
> As I mentioned before, the facts are going to be very convoluted in this case and both sides will present very convincing and qualified experts that will completely contradict each other.  PR is going to be critical in this matter and likely have a very persuasive impact on a settlement or on a jury.  The fact that Carlos and US Soccer don't recognize that is just another example of their mind-numbing incompetence.
> 
> 100%.  Very well said.


Having been an attorney and having litigated for non-profits, I can tell you that its not misleading.  This is how it works.  Outside Counsel reports to In-House Counsel.  If In-House Counsel gives the green light that is all that matters.  Rarely, if ever does In-House counsel involve the "Executive Team" to review legal filings because the Executive Team generally are not lawyers and do not have the education to evaluate legal filings through the correct lens.

We disagree and my experience tells me its highly unlikely these pleadings were vetted by anybody in US Soccer, except for In-House Counsel.


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## watfly (Mar 12, 2020)

MWN said:


> Having been an attorney and having litigated for non-profits, I can tell you that its not misleading.  This is how it works.  Outside Counsel reports to In-House Counsel.  If In-House Counsel gives the green light that is all that matters.  Rarely, if ever does In-House counsel involve the "Executive Team" to review legal filings because the Executive Team generally are not lawyers and do not have the education to evaluate legal filings through the correct lens.
> 
> We disagree and my experience tells me its highly unlikely these pleadings were vetted by anybody in US Soccer, except for In-House Counsel.


That's really unfortunate that they handled their litigation in that manner, I can't think of any reason why counsel would want to preserve "plausible deniability" for the Executive Director.  It's one thing to rely on the guidance of your general counsel, it's a whole other thing to give general counsel unfettered authority.   It's very poor corporate governance and bad policy, both legally and operationally.   Just because other non-profits handle their business that way doesn't excuse Carlos and US Soccer.  What did our parents say when we mimicked the bad behavior of another kid, "So if Johnny jumped off the cliff, you'd do it too?"  My experience tells me it should absolutely vetted by executives and shame on inside and outside counsel for not considering the "non-legal" aspects of the litigation.


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## Ellejustus (Mar 12, 2020)

I told you guys before.  Woman have been treated bad since I got on this planet 53 years ago.  I know the guys who have been treating woman like sh*t too!  I see some improvement but way more needs to be done.  Harvey treated woman like poop and now has to walk with a roller and now he has chest pains.


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## Dos Equis (Mar 12, 2020)

MWN said:


> Having been an attorney and having litigated for non-profits, I can tell you that its not misleading.  This is how it works.  Outside Counsel reports to In-House Counsel.  If In-House Counsel gives the green light that is all that matters.  Rarely, if ever does In-House counsel involve the "Executive Team" to review legal filings because the Executive Team generally are not lawyers and do not have the education to evaluate legal filings through the correct lens.
> 
> We disagree and my experience tells me its highly unlikely these pleadings were vetted by anybody in US Soccer, except for In-House Counsel.


My experience with high profile litigation that is likely to be subject to public scrutiny, as a member of the "Executive Team", is all legal filings are reviewed by more than just the lawyers.  With any litigation, at a minimum, we had to understand the claims against us, and our defense strategy. If the bucked stopped with me, I read everything.  I was also looking through the lens of a person who had to defend our position in the court of public/customer/employee opinion.  

I will not say lawyers did not have "the education" to evaluate how the legal filings might negatively impact management, the organization/company and the employees.  The best lawyers always took that into account in their counsel, and gave us warning of the risks.

Carlos Cordeiro's apology is an admission that he mismanaged this case as President of US Soccer.


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## Keepermom2 (Mar 12, 2020)

Dos Equis said:


> My experience with high profile litigation that is likely to be subject to public scrutiny, as a member of the "Executive Team", is all legal filings are reviewed by more than just the lawyers.  With any litigation, at a minimum, we had to understand the claims against us, and our defense strategy. If the bucked stopped with me, I read everything.  I was also looking through the lens of a person who had to defend our position in the court of public/customer/employee opinion.
> 
> I will not say lawyers did not have "the education" to evaluate how the legal filings might negatively impact management, the organization/company and the employees.  The best lawyers always took that into account in their counsel, and gave us warning of the risks.
> 
> Carlos Cordeiro's apology is an admission that he mismanaged this case as President of US Soccer.


Agree 100%.  The Board meetings that I have been in for publicly held companies include discussions of draft legal agreements that were received by the Board members and executive committees at least 3 days prior to the meeting.  Whether this occurred or not at US Soccer is irrelevant because either way, the leadership proved they are not qualified to lead an organization such as US Soccer.

To not consider the impact on current and future sponsorship is just beyond ridiculous.  That is management's responsibility.  Look how Coke spoke up immediately.


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## Keepermom2 (Mar 12, 2020)

FYI  *The original four plaintiffs had filed separately and prior to the negotiated contract and the negotiated contract did not have any impact on their charge of discrimination filed in 2016 related to the discrimination that occurred in the prior years.
*
NPR March 2019 "The issue of unequal pay has been a highly contentious matter in recent years, and the U.S. women's team has kept the pressure on U.S. Soccer. The women's team reached a new collective bargaining agreement with the federation in 2017."

"Four of the plaintiffs — Morgan, Lloyd, Rapinoe and Becky Sauerbrunn — filed a charge of discrimination with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in 2016, on behalf of themselves and similarly situated players. But no progress was made, and last month, the EEOC issued letters giving the four the right to sue."


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## MWN (Mar 12, 2020)

@watfly & @Dos Equis,

We need to remember that these statements were made in "Opposition" to a Summary Judgment Motion filed by the players. The role of counsel in litigation is to preserve their clients rights by contesting all of the items, unless instructed not too. When the players filed their motion for Summary Judgment they claimed all of the elements of to allow judgment in their favor where met.  US Soccer was then required to oppose the motion claiming the elements were not met.  Both the Players and US Soccer have summary judgement motions pending.

In this instance, the Motion by the women was filed on 2/20/2020 and the response was due a few weeks later (9th of March).   Counsel had less than 3 weeks to research and formulate a response to the motion.  The draft of the response was probably only finished on the 4th or 5th of March and US Soccer likely had very little time to review and/or change anything if they could.  There simply was not weeks to sit on this response and have upper management and the PR people debate squat.

Element 2 requires Plaintiffs (USWNT establish they are paid less “for equal work on jobs the performance of which requires equal skill, effort, and responsibility, and which are performed under similar working conditions”).  US Soccer's ultimate position is that by law the focus is on "job requirements" and to this end because there are far fewer Women's National Teams and many more Men's National Team its harder for the USMNT to meet the job requirements.  "The point is that the job of MNT player (competing against senior men’s national teams) requires a higher level of skill based on speed and strength than does the job of WNT player (competing against senior women’s national teams)" (Opposition p.12:16-19). 

Absent US Soccer expressly advising the lawyers to concede a critical element (namely element (2) of the EPA statute (29 USC 206(d)).  The lawyers did what they should have done and the fact that some lawyers litigating and contesting every point doesn't mean those points are how US Soccer really feels.


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## MWN (Mar 12, 2020)

Bottom line this lawsuit ultimately will cause US Soccer to raise the pay for the USWNT players and defund the pay for NWSL participation.  The argument the USWNT players are making is the court should ignore pay to these same players for their participation in the NWSL.  The NWSL pay was part of the collective bargaining agreement and now the women want to ignore it and have the Court turn a blind eye.

The stars will receive about the same at the end of the day (more than the men) as long as they continue to win.


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## EOTL (Mar 12, 2020)

pulguita said:


> Please tell me how the current deal with US  Soccer discriminates against women?   They made the deal.   So are you telling me FIFA should pay the women the same amount as the men even though they don't produce the same revenue.


Hey buddies!  It’s been a while...

I am happy to answer your question. When an employer says your options are either less money or no money and calls that “negotiation”, that is gender discrimination. Even if an employer pays women similar money - although they provide more value and generate more profit doing the same job - that is gender discrimInation. When USSF rationalizes paying Michael Bradley (an embarrassment to all Americans) more than Julie Ertz (a national hero) because Lionel Messi generates revenue for a completely different company (FIFA), that is gender discrimination. What requires USSF to spend the money it receives from FIFA on the men who did absolutely nothing to justify the amount of the prize money anyway? Shoot, the MNT probably reduces the size of the FIFA prize money given that viewership was up in the most recent WC for which the MNT failed to qualify.

If USSF wants compensate the teams based on the revenue they bring in, it needs to actually compensate them based on the revenue they bring in, rather than attributing a revenue stream to the men that they did nothing to generate while simultaneously excluding by far the biggest source of revenue and profit - advertising dollars - that the women generate. Nike recently said the WNT jersey is its best selling jersey of all time - more than Barcelona and Brazil. That’s a polite way of saying the MNT doesn’t even move the needle. Alex Morgan alone sells more jerseys than the entire MNT. Nike also noted that it recently became the largest seller of bras in North America and that sales of women’s gear was up double digits in 2019. The women are responsible for the size of the Nike contract without question. The women also drive USSF’s other eight figure deal with VW for reasons previously stated before I moved to an acronym.

The long and the short of it is the women deserve far more money than the men because they are responsible for the bulk of USSF’s profit. To the extent any men raise revenue for USSF, it is Messi, Ronaldo and the Mexican national team who are raising it. The MNT could put any 11 stooges on the pitch instead of the current 10 plus Pulisic without any impact on its bottom line. If it tries that with the women, USSF goes bankrupt.


----------



## EOTL (Mar 12, 2020)

MWN said:


> Bottom line this lawsuit ultimately will cause US Soccer to raise the pay for the USWNT players and defund the pay for NWSL participation.  The argument the USWNT players are making is the court should ignore pay to these same players for their participation in the NWSL.  The NWSL pay was part of the collective bargaining agreement and now the women want to ignore it and have the Court turn a blind eye.
> 
> The stars will receive about the same at the end of the day (more than the men) as long as they continue to win.


Maybe, but I don’t think so. USSF knows the NWSL’s continued existence is critical to the continued success of the WNT which, in turn, is critical to inking future fat advertising deals. It is essentially paying those women the extra $100k to play an extra 20+ games a season, not to provide the same effort, or less as it offensively claims in the motion.  It doesn’t need to pay the men that money to play those extra games because, for some reason I do not understand, someone else is willing to pay the likes of DeAndre Yedlin to play them or at least have front row seat. USSF should not look that gift horse in the mouth.  If it defunds what it puts toward the NWSL, the WNT falls apart when the women get real jobs instead, the WNT starts to lose, and the bulk of USSF’s advertising dollars go away.


----------



## EOTL (Mar 12, 2020)

Leave it to USSF to make deeply offensive and misogynistic comments just as every sporting event in the world has been cancelled, leaving ESPN with nothing else to talk about.


----------



## watfly (Mar 12, 2020)

Cordeiro resigns from USSF amid equal pay row
					

U.S. Soccer Federation president Carlos Cordeiro resigned Thursday amid the fallout from a gender-discrimination lawsuit filed by U.S. women.




					www.espn.com
				




Don't let the door hit you in ass on the way out.  His tenure at US Soccer will be a case-study at MBA schools for centuries on how not to run a non-profit.  Hopefully the first move by the acting president will be to terminate inside and outside counsel.


----------



## espola (Mar 12, 2020)

watfly said:


> Cordeiro resigns from USSF amid equal pay row
> 
> 
> U.S. Soccer Federation president Carlos Cordeiro resigned Thursday amid the fallout from a gender-discrimination lawsuit filed by U.S. women.
> ...


Wasn't he just following the example of his predecessor?


----------



## watfly (Mar 12, 2020)

espola said:


> Wasn't he just following the example of his predecessor?


Good point.


----------



## Keepermom2 (Mar 12, 2020)

watfly said:


> Cordeiro resigns from USSF amid equal pay row
> 
> 
> U.S. Soccer Federation president Carlos Cordeiro resigned Thursday amid the fallout from a gender-discrimination lawsuit filed by U.S. women.
> ...


I am sure Coke, Visa, and Nike among others helped US soccer with that decision.  I am not sure that just blaming the President and his resignation will be enough to correct this PR nightmare.


----------



## watfly (Mar 12, 2020)

Keepermom2 said:


> I am sure Coke, Visa, and Nike among others helped US soccer with that decision.  I am not sure that just blaming the President and his resignation will be enough to correct this PR nightmare.


I suspect he would still be employed if it weren't for the sponsors' involvement.  I don't think he would have come to the conclusion that he was a idiot without their assistance.

I would hope that a savvy leader could mitigate the PR damage, but the old guard isn't going to get it done.


----------



## Soccerfan2 (Mar 12, 2020)

watfly said:


> I suspect he would still be employed if it weren't for the sponsors' involvement.  I don't think he would have come to the conclusion that he was a idiot without their assistance.


Exactly


----------



## Dos Equis (Mar 12, 2020)

MWN said:


> @watfly & @Dos Equis,
> 
> We need to remember that these statements were made in "Opposition" to a Summary Judgment Motion filed by the players. The role of counsel in litigation is to preserve their clients rights by contesting all of the items, unless instructed not too. When the players filed their motion for Summary Judgment they claimed all of the elements of to allow judgment in their favor where met.  US Soccer was then required to oppose the motion claiming the elements were not met.  Both the Players and US Soccer have summary judgement motions pending.
> 
> ...


I agree with you, the lawyers have a responsibility to present to management all possible defenses.  But management has the responsibility to understand the consequences of each strategy/argument. This is not the lawyer's fault.

To not understand how their counter argument would be viewed by the women, and the general public, is unacceptable.  Conceding the jobs are the same (element 2), or finding another way to argue the jobs are different (without claiming/implying women are inferior), are the only common sense options.  The legal option they choose was unconscionable.  

Carlos is out.  That is a good first step. But it is not enough.


----------



## outside! (Mar 13, 2020)

Keepermom2 said:


> I am sure Coke, Visa, and Nike among others helped US soccer with that decision.  I am not sure that just blaming the President and his resignation will be enough to correct this PR nightmare.


USSF still has the same board, so the power structure really has not changed all that much.


----------



## MWN (Mar 13, 2020)

outside! said:


> USSF still has the same board, so the power structure really has not changed all that much.


Some of the changes under Carlos was to add a GM and transfer much of the decision making to the Executive Team, a departure from the previous President.  The executive staff (Remedi, Wahlke, Buethe, Raina, Wallach, and Stewart) hold most of the real power. See, https://www.ussoccer.com/governance/board-of-directors/about

Remember, all of the Board members are volunteers (including the President (Cordeiro now Cone).  The Board essentially rubber stamps the recommendations of the Executive team.

Having attended the last AGM (Nashville) and the Feb 2020 US Soccer board meeting, reviewed the 2019 minutes, and had multiple conversations with leaders of the various councils and board members, I can personally tell you there is a tremendous amount of misconceptions related to US Soccer.  At its core, you have some very intelligent people serving on the Board with a passion for growing the game.  They are all volunteers and spend significant time looking at the bigger picture.  US Soccer is not the same type of non-profit that your local club operates.  The employees and officers do almost all of the heavy lifting.

But make absolutely no mistake.  Because the Player's Council enjoys weighted votes and consistently votes as a unified bloc, the Player's council and the Pro Council members ultimately run the show.  Nobody is elected to the President or Vice President position without the Player's council stamp.  In fact, this year Cindy Cone was challenged by John Motta for VP.  Cone didn't campaign and won by a landslide because she knew the Adult and Youth Council would be all over the board with their votes, and the Athletes and Pro Council would vote as a unified bloc.


----------



## watfly (Mar 13, 2020)

MWN said:


> Some of the changes under Carlos was to add a GM and transfer much of the decision making to the Executive Team, a departure from the previous President.  The executive staff (Remedi, Wahlke, Buethe, Raina, Wallach, and Stewart) hold most of the real power. See, https://www.ussoccer.com/governance/board-of-directors/about
> 
> Remember, all of the Board members are volunteers (including the President (Cordeiro now Cone).  The Board essentially rubber stamps the recommendations of the Executive team.
> 
> ...


I don't doubt any of this.  I'm sure there are some very intelligent and soccer passionate people involved with US Soccer.  Unfortunately, I have to judge US Soccer by the actual decisions it makes.  Give it credit for the VW deal and getting the World Cup.  However, these have been overwhelmed by  a litany of poor to horrendous decisions made by US Soccer in the last few years (not all under Cordeiro).  Despite some of my hyperbole regarding stupidity, I think the incompetence is really being driven by arrogance.  Based upon my experience, US Soccer needs a culture change at minimum and possibly a full reorganization.

As far as the pay equity issue goes, US Soccer has some very valid defenses to the WNT's claims (particularly the guaranteed pay issue).  However, they have to tread carefully PR wise.  The Court of Public Opinion is very important in this matter.  They have to look at this issue with a much broader view than just a legal standpoint.

On the flipside, the WNT can't just rely on the Court of Public Opinion and have to be realistic about the facts that aren't in their favor.  MWN, many of which you have pointed out in very good detail.


----------



## Keepermom2 (Mar 13, 2020)

Yeah...In reviewing the make up of the Board, I noted only the independent directors had the background that could have foreseen the backlash and the need to review what was going to become a public document. My experience with independent directors of nonprofits is they are window dressing for the organization and the director.  Their input is generally limited to a meeting one time a year.  Maybe it is different at US Soccer.  I am pretty certain EY will leave off their volunteering for US Soccer from their proposals for now.

I am guessing that the sponsors that met with US Soccer laid some ultimatums on the table including the requirement for a plan as to how they are going to fix this situation.  I believe that plan will include settlement with the women in the very near future.  I don't see how they continue to fight with fervor and come out of this situation without huge backlash including loss of sponsors that pay US Soccer more than the woman are asking for.


----------



## pulguita (Mar 17, 2020)

Who here noticed that the protesting USWNT wore there jerseys inside out dissing the US but had perfectly reversed NIKE logos on the inside of their jerseys?  Who has a Nike jersey where you can see the logo through the screen print of their jerseys on the inside?  This has been planned and "F" Nike.  I have not bought a Nike product in over a year and will never do so again!


----------



## espola (Mar 17, 2020)

pulguita said:


> Who here noticed that the protesting USWNT wore there jerseys inside out dissing the US but had perfectly reversed NIKE logos on the inside of their jerseys?  Who has a Nike jersey where you can see the logo through the screen print of their jerseys on the inside?  This has been planned and "F" Nike.  I have not bought a Nike product in over a year and will never do so again!


The Nike logo is embroidered, so it shows up on both sides.

And it was their warmups, not their game jerseys.


----------



## pulguita (Mar 17, 2020)

espola said:


> The Nike logo is embroidered, so it shows up on both sides.
> 
> And it was their warmups, not their game jerseys.


Thank you for correcting me with the embroidery.  Nike can still KMA  along with the WNT.


----------



## espola (Mar 17, 2020)

pulguita said:


> Thank you for correcting me with the embroidery.  Nike can still KMA  along with the WNT.


Other than your emotional response, do you have some specific issue?


----------



## EOTL (Mar 17, 2020)

pulguita said:


> Thank you for correcting me with the embroidery.  Nike can still KMA  along with the WNT.


Nike thanks you for the free publicity. As they knew with Kaepernick, every douche who whines about equality and opposes Nike’s support of civil rights only helps generate more sales.  So keep up the good work.


----------



## pulguita (Mar 17, 2020)

EOTL said:


> Nike thanks you for the free publicity. As they knew with Kaepernick, every douche who whines about equality and opposes Nike’s support of civil rights only helps generate more sales.  So keep up the good work.


Nope don't need to resort to social media to give Nike any free pub.  It's the old fashioned Breck commercial way - he told 2 friends and they told 2 friends and so on and so on.........


----------



## espola (Mar 17, 2020)

pulguita said:


> Nope don't need to resort to social media to give Nike any free pub.  It's the old fashioned Breck commercial way - he told 2 friends and they told 2 friends and so on and so on.........


The guy who put the "repeat" in "lather - rinse - repeat" retired wealthy.


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## EOTL (Mar 17, 2020)

pulguita said:


> Nope don't need to resort to social media to give Nike any free pub.  It's the old fashioned Breck commercial way - he told 2 friends and they told 2 friends and so on and so on.........


Uh, Breck controlled 20% of the shampoo market when it came up with this slogan.  Now it is only sold by Dollar Tree.


----------



## LASTMAN14 (Mar 17, 2020)

EOTL said:


> Uh, Breck controlled 20% of the shampoo market when it came up with this slogan.  Now it is only sold by Dollar Tree.


Is it me or does Dollar Tree and Big Lot's have a funky smell when you walk in. Though I scored on TP at the Big Lot's in Hermosa Beach.


----------



## EOTL (Mar 17, 2020)

LASTMAN14 said:


> Is it me or does Dollar Tree and Big Lot's have a funky smell when you walk in. Though I scored on TP at the Big Lot's in Hermosa Beach.


I can’t say I’ve ever been to one, but if they’ve got TP, that will definitely change.


----------



## LASTMAN14 (Mar 18, 2020)

EOTL said:


> I can’t say I’ve ever been to one, but if they’ve got TP, that will definitely change.


I don't typically shop there either but TP is like gold.


----------



## watfly (Apr 2, 2020)

Hopefully, they refunded some of their fees.









						Equal pay lawsuit: Firm that filed sexist legal strategy for US Soccer officially off the case
					

The lawsuit has officially changed folders for US Soccer as it seeks a settlement over trial.




					sports.yahoo.com


----------



## Soccerfan2 (Apr 2, 2020)

watfly said:


> Hopefully, they refunded some of their fees.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


It would be so nice to see Cone lead them to a mutually agreeable settlement.


----------



## Soccer43 (Apr 5, 2020)

So wonder what they mean by Lydia Wahlke being on leave - does that mean she is fired?  Is this a disciplinary leave or is she out for stress and embarrassment.  Pretty bad for a woman to be giving her stamp of approval on such a terrible and insulting legal argument against other women.  I think it is worse coming from another female.  She should have known better just from her own experience of being a female attorney working in the professional sports world.


----------



## Ellejustus (Apr 5, 2020)

Soccer43 said:


> So wonder what they mean by Lydia Wahlke being on leave - does that mean she is fired?  Is this a disciplinary leave or is she out for stress and embarrassment.  Pretty bad for a woman to be giving her stamp of approval on such a terrible and insulting legal argument against other women.  I think it is worse coming from another female.  She should have known better just from her own experience of being a female attorney working in the professional sports world.


Blame it all on Lydia just makes the men look lame.  The men behind the masks told her to it is my guess.  However, maybe Lydia got the job at lead attorney because of this legal argument?  If so, her career is over and she seems smarter than that imo.  I told all of you 98% of lawsuits settle.  I said it was 98% in favor of Alex Morgan and the ladies.  Now it's 99.1% in favor of the plaintiffs.  Again, any good attorney will tell you no case is a 100%.  This one is real close.


----------



## MacDre (Apr 5, 2020)

Ellejustus said:


> Blame it all on Lydia just makes the men look lame.  The men behind the masks told her to it is my guess.  However, maybe Lydia got the job at lead attorney because of this legal argument?  If so, her career is over and she seems smarter than that imo.  I told all of you 98% of lawsuits settle.  I said it was 98% in favor of Alex Morgan and the ladies.  Now it's 99.1% in favor of the plaintiffs.  Again, any good attorney will tell you no case is a 100%.  This one is real close.


Lydia is in the hot seat because it was her job to retain and manage outside counsel.

I think Parlow-Cone is in a difficult position.  If I was representing the USWNT I would advise them to only accept an offer that granted all requested damages.

USSF and Biglaw needed to win this case during pre-trial motions.  They didn’t win and their facts suck.  The guys at Biglaw tend to be paper pushers that are scared of court because most of them suck at it.  I’m not sure what laws the case was filed under but there may also be potential punitive damages as well for fraud or deceit.

USSF has no choice but to give the USWNT what they ask for.  They should do it sooner rather than later.


----------



## Ellejustus (Apr 5, 2020)

MacDre said:


> Lydia is in the hot seat because it was her job to retain and manage outside counsel.
> 
> I think Parlow-Cone is in a difficult position.  If I was representing the USWNT I would advise them to only accept an offer that granted all requested damages.
> 
> ...


Excellent perspective.  Pre-trial motions is the most incredible process of trying to see who is being most honest and who is a scammer or a cheat. It goes both ways.  One side has their damage claims and it's what they think is the truth all the while the other side has been telling them to "F" Off for a few years and they owe you squat.  "Go away and stop complaining" they say.  Attorneys get in the action all day. Non emotional folks they are.  I got to meet a Mediator one day and I must say he has one of the best jobs in America.  I hear they make $8K for a days work and some legal preview time and write up his conclusions and let both sides know his legal opinion, which is always this: "No case is 100%.  You could win and never see a dime.  You could win and wait forever to get paid as most will appeal.  You could win and the defendants file for BK and no money to give.  Or, you could lose because one lone juror hates your ass.  So the mediator will usually tell you to take deal and your attorneys will agree.  I hear this is after 10 hours holed up in some office building in LA to help two sides stop whining and get a deal done before 7pm.  Nice life and it saves America major hate and war for a long trial.  I hear it all come at a head at mediation day.  I wonder if they have started with depositions? My buddy, who plays lawyer all day, told me he knows he has a really good value case is when folks who delay or try to get out of their depo.


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## Ellejustus (Apr 5, 2020)

I might add, I've been a little harsh towards attorneys at times.  It's a love hate relationship, like the dentist. I love America because we have a legal system. Although not perfect, when one get's hurt or does something stupid and or illegal, they can make a call and get real HELP!!!.  Attorney's and I are opposites emotionally wise.  I have so much respect for them though.  They have to take all of our sh*t (Demons) out of each others toilets and then separate the truth somehow.  Basically, clean it up so we don;t kill each other with the "Carl" Demon of murder.  I'm dead serious you guys.  TY to all attorneys for saving lives and destruction and protecting the innocent and getting justice for the oppressed.  Help people through nasty divorces. Help woman have a voice.  Thank you thank you


----------



## EOTL (Apr 5, 2020)

Soccer43 said:


> So wonder what they mean by Lydia Wahlke being on leave - does that mean she is fired?  Is this a disciplinary leave or is she out for stress and embarrassment.  Pretty bad for a woman to be giving her stamp of approval on such a terrible and insulting legal argument against other women.  I think it is worse coming from another female.  She should have known better just from her own experience of being a female attorney working in the professional sports world.


Being placed on administrative leave almost always means you’re about to get fired if, as is the case here, there’s no dispute over the reason you are on leave. The interesting thing, though, is that Cordiero initially tried to save his own job by throwing her under the bus when he recommended that USSF fire and replace her with Latham & Watkins. Typical misogynistic USSF douche.

Does anyone really think Cone will turn anything around? USSF will have her settle the case to save their own asses, pat her on the head like a good little lady, and then come down hard on her a year later because she couldn’t turn around the financial woes caused by a bunch of misogynistic dudes and a female lawyer whom they used for cover. They’ll also probably blame Cone for GDA’s final downfall because, you know, she’s a woman.  It couldn’t possibly be the result of a bunch of dumb men in a room making dumb rules that doomed GDA from the start.


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## Ellejustus (Apr 5, 2020)

EOTL said:


> Being placed on administrative leave almost always means you’re about to get fired if, as is the case here, there’s no dispute over the reason you are on leave. The interesting thing, though, is that Cordiero initially tried to save his own job by throwing her under the bus when he recommended that USSF fire and replace her with Latham & Watkins. Typical misogynistic USSF douche.
> 
> Does anyone really think Cone will turn anything around? USSF will have her settle the case to save their own asses, pat her on the head like a good little lady, and then come down hard on her a year later because she couldn’t turn around the financial woes caused by a bunch of misogynistic dudes and a female lawyer whom they used for cover. They’ll also probably blame Cone for GDA’s final downfall because, you know, she’s a woman.  It couldn’t possibly be the result of a bunch of dumb men in a room making dumb rules that doomed GDA from the start.


100% agree.  Blame it on the rain too and the virus............


----------



## Frank (May 1, 2020)

USWNT's unequal pay claim rejected by judge
					

A federal judge said members of the U.S. women's national soccer team did not demonstrate a "triable issue" that they were paid less than players on the men's team.




					www.espn.com
				




Well there goes the argument that the women are paid less.


----------



## Sheriff Joe (May 1, 2020)

Frank said:


> USWNT's unequal pay claim rejected by judge
> 
> 
> A federal judge said members of the U.S. women's national soccer team did not demonstrate a "triable issue" that they were paid less than players on the men's team.
> ...


The “women” are becoming too political.


----------



## Sheriff Joe (May 2, 2020)

I hope they lose every game.








						Judge Throws Out Lawsuit On Equal Pay From Women’s National Soccer Team
					

A judge dismissed the U.S. women's soccer team's equal pay claim Friday but will allow allegations of discrimination to continue to trial.




					dailycaller.com


----------



## espola (May 2, 2020)

Sheriff Joe said:


> I hope they lose every game.


Why is that?


----------



## MWN (May 3, 2020)

MWN said:


> The first step is to understand the current differences in pay.  The women are paid "guaranteed" amounts, whereas the men are not paid any guaranteed amounts.  As a result, the men get paid more for meeting certain milestones, whereas the women are paid less.
> 
> 
> MEN (Per Collective Bargain)WOMEN (Per Collective Bargain)SALARY (National Team Contract) 17 Players (16 in 2021)$0.00 (No US Soccer Salary)*$100,000*MLS/NWSL Bonus by US Soccer$0.00 (No US Soccer Bonus)*$67,500* (Tier 1)
> ...


Looks like the judge got it right (or is reading my posts ... which would mean he would always be right).  The USWNT lawsuit claiming unequal pay rested on a fiction and falsehood that went against hundreds of years of case law ... "competent adults are free to make bad deals."

The remaining claims will be settled because its simply not worth pursuing for either party.   US Soccer will likely throw the USWNT a bone equal to the nuisance value of the remaining claims so the USWNT can save face, but the fact will always remain that the lawsuit was doomed from the start.


----------



## MWN (May 3, 2020)

Summary Judgement Order:


			https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cacd.739234/gov.uscourts.cacd.739234.250.0.pdf


----------



## MWN (May 3, 2020)

Soccer43 said:


> So wonder what they mean by Lydia Wahlke being on leave - does that mean she is fired?  Is this a disciplinary leave or is she out for stress and embarrassment.  Pretty bad for a woman to be giving her stamp of approval on such a terrible and insulting legal argument against other women.  I think it is worse coming from another female.  She should have known better just from her own experience of being a female attorney working in the professional sports world.


At her level she is being put on leave to give her an opportunity to find something else (another job).  She screwed up by not protecting the Federation from outside counsel's aggressive arguments.  It was her job to manage outside counsel and she didn't do it in a way that would prevent a PR problem.


----------



## Messi>CR7 (May 3, 2020)

MWN said:


> Looks like the judge got it right (or is reading my posts ... which would mean he would always be right).  The USWNT lawsuit claiming unequal pay rested on a fiction and falsehood that went against hundreds of years of case law ... "competent adults are free to make bad deals."
> 
> The remaining claims will be settled because its simply not worth pursuing for either party.   US Soccer will likely throw the USWNT a bone equal to the nuisance value of the remaining claims so the USWNT can save face, but the fact will always remain that the lawsuit was doomed from the start.


I thought common sense would drive USWNT to sell high (when Cordeiro resigned) and settle for a decent amount when public support was at the highest.  Why would they let the case go to a summary judgment when the facts of the case were not on their side?


----------



## MacDre (May 3, 2020)

Messi>CR7 said:


> I thought common sense would drive USWNT to sell high (when Cordeiro resigned) and settle for a decent amount when public support was at the highest.  Why would they let the case go to a summary judgment when the facts of the case were not on their side?


I think there’s still hope.




__





						Redirect Notice
					





					www.google.com


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## MWN (May 3, 2020)

Messi>CR7 said:


> I thought common sense would drive USWNT to sell high (when Cordeiro resigned) and settle for a decent amount when public support was at the highest.  Why would they let the case go to a summary judgment when the facts of the case were not on their side?


Two reasons: (1) their legal counsel are not that smart; and (2) its a political ploy that was working well and because their counsel wasn't that smart, they rode the horse way too far.

The USWNT's argument of unequal pay was predicated on ignoring the "guaranteed" nature of their negotiated contract.  Because the USWNT compensation and NWSL salaries are tied to the Collective Bargaining Agreement the judge properly rejected that position.  This paragraph sums up the nature of why the USWNT could never prevail:



> This history of negotiations between the parties demonstrates that the WNT rejected an offer to
> be paid under the same pay-to-play structure as the MNT, and that the WNT was willing to forgo higher
> bonuses for other benefits, such as greater base compensation and the guarantee of a higher number of
> contracted players. Accordingly, *Plaintiffs cannot now retroactively deem their CBA worse than the
> ...





MacDre said:


> I think there’s still hope.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


No hope, just a politician with no basic understanding of the facts of the case doing what politicians do ... talking out of his ass.


----------



## SoccerGeek (May 3, 2020)

Keepermom2 said:


> Yeah I don't see how they have a leg to stand on with FIFA bonuses and asking US to make up the difference.  Doesn't make sense to me but would it make sense to a jury?
> 
> Speaking of the entertainment factor...the women's US ticket sales exceeded the men's ticket sales  for games played in the US and;
> 
> ...


Wrong!!!..get your facts straight before you text stupidity.

Football: *2018 World Cup* watched by record 3.5 billion people, says *Fifa*. (REUTERS) - A record audience of more than 3.5 billion people watched this year's *World Cup* in *Russia*, with the final between France and Croatia attracting 1.12 billion *viewers*, football's *world* governing body said on Friday (Dec 21).Dec 21, 2018

*FIFA* announced on Friday that a combined 1.12 billion viewers tuned into official broadcast coverage of the *2019 Women's World Cup* held in France. The final match between the United States and the Netherlands drew an average live audience of 82.18 million and reached a total of 263.62 million unique viewers.


----------



## Sheriff Joe (May 3, 2020)

MacDre said:


> I think there’s still hope.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Biden already forgot about it.


----------



## Keepermom2 (May 4, 2020)

MWN said:


> Two reasons: (1) their legal counsel are not that smart; and (2) its a political ploy that was working well and because their counsel wasn't that smart, they rode the horse way too far.
> 
> The USWNT's argument of unequal pay was predicated on ignoring the "guaranteed" nature of their negotiated contract.  Because the USWNT compensation and NWSL salaries are tied to the Collective Bargaining Agreement the judge properly rejected that position.  This paragraph sums up the nature of why the USWNT could never prevail:
> 
> ...


When I read this part the other day all bets were off...I can no longer defend them:

This history of negotiations between the parties demonstrates that the WNT rejected an offer to
 be paid under the same pay-to-play structure as the MNT, and that the WNT was willing to forgo higher
 bonuses for other benefits, such as greater base compensation and the guarantee of a higher number of
 contracted players. 

I have no idea why they think they stand a chance in appeal.  While women have often negotiated contracts less than what they deserved because it was either that or no job, obviously that is not the situation here so I don't see how they have any basis for taking this portion of the case further.


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## MWN (May 4, 2020)

Keepermom2 said:


> When I read this part the other day all bets were off...I can no longer defend them:
> 
> This history of negotiations between the parties demonstrates that the WNT rejected an offer to
> be paid under the same pay-to-play structure as the MNT, and that the WNT was willing to forgo higher
> ...


Its always been a fact, the WNT never wanted the same deal the men had because the MNT's deal was not guaranteed.  They negotiated a deal with a better downside and less upside.  This has always been my problem with the lawsuit the WNT players made, they cherry picked the elements of the deal they made that could be worse and ignored the elements of the deal that were better.  The law has always been that we look at the "total compensation."  

Analogy: Let's say I need two sales people and I'm offering a commission only.  Male salesperson comes in and say: "I'll take the job, no base salary and a commission of 10%."  Great your hired.  Female salesperson comes in and says: "I can't do commission only."  Ok, what can you do?  "I need a base salary of $100k, health and dental, but I'll take a smaller commission, say 5%."  Hmmm ... we negotiate and arrive at a deal.  A few years later, the Female salesperson sues me for unequal treatment claiming her 5% commission is less than the man's 10% and asks the court to ignore the fact she was paid a guaranteed $100k base with benefits and the man wasn't. 

Its freaking insane and I've been baffled why so many on this board just don't get it, the Federation made a deal designed to promote the woman's game and support the NWSL as part of the collective bargaining agreement.  The USWNT's union rejected and the men's deal and wanted something different and now are suing because in hindsight they think they could have made more?  Bad faith.

The most striking thing and something that I did not appreciate was that over the course of the period at issue in the lawsuit the USWNT was paid an average of $220k and the USMNT was paid an average of $213k ... THEY WERE PAID MORE and the payments ignored the NWSL salaries, which likely would have put them over $300k.  That is just plain old bad faith on the part of the USWNT, shame on them for wasting millions in legal fees.


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## rainbow_unicorn (May 4, 2020)

MWN said:


> The most striking thing and something that I did not appreciate was that over the course of the period at issue in the lawsuit the USWNT was paid an average of $220k and the USMNT was paid an average of $213k ... THEY WERE PAID MORE


$220k vs. $213k is basically the same...but that's also considering the USWNT won the world cup and the men's didn't qualify.  What would have been the payouts if the women didn't qualify and the men won the World Cup?


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## MWN (May 4, 2020)

rainbow_unicorn said:


> $220k vs. $213k is basically the same...but that's also considering the USWNT won the world cup and the men's didn't qualify.  What would have been the payouts if the women didn't qualify and the men won the World Cup?


Are we going to ignore OR also count the guaranteed salary and health benefits the men don't get when coming up with the calculation?  The law says we are supposed to consider that ... but the Women's PR machine (and losing lawyers) want us to ignore this.

Edit: Do we take into account that there are 32 men's team in the Men's World Cup, and only 24 for the Women's World Cup?  Do we also take into account the prize money "FIFA" and not the US distributes is not the same ($30M v. $400M)?


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## es_surf (May 4, 2020)

MWN said:


> Are we going to ignore OR also count the guaranteed salary and health benefits the men don't get when coming up with the calculation?  The law says we are supposed to consider that ... but the Women's PR machine (and losing lawyers) want us to ignore this.
> 
> Edit: Do we take into account that there are 32 men's team in the Men's World Cup, and only 24 for the Women's World Cup?  Do we also take into account the prize money "FIFA" and not the US distributes is not the same ($30M v. $400M)?


MWN, i havent been following this for a long time,..but from reading your posts, it appears you have a legal background?
Everything you have said is spot on correct, which is why it would appear you have a legal background. Not only is the WNT lawyer bad, but i suspect could be subject to malpractice. 
Like many folks, I ignored the actual details of what was going on here and just assumed the #Equalpay had some validity and a leg to stand on (shame on me for just assuming). What person would not support equal pay and treatment for women?  i have two daughters, so of course I support that. #Equalpay a handy catch phrase that is easy for uneducated followers to grab on to and support without looking into the somewhat complicated facts. My background is both finance and contracts, and as soon as i looked at the facts, it was clear to me this Equalpay mantra was a scam. 
The WNT players can only bey one of two things,..1) completely lacking any knowledge of what they are doing with respect to CBA structure and value of both their guarantee and benefits compensation that they received in lieu of pay to play, and thus actually think they are in the right in their stance,..or 2) complete crooks and are try to steal money.  Thats the only two possibilities from what I can see,..and as far as I am concerned, both lead to the WNT being poor roll models for our young ladies and women.


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## watfly (May 4, 2020)

es_surf said:


> MWN, i havent been following this for a long time,..but from reading your posts, it appears you have a legal background?
> Everything you have said is spot on correct, which is why it would appear you have a legal background. Not only is the WNT lawyer bad, but i suspect could be subject to malpractice.
> Like many folks, I ignored the actual details of what was going on here and just assumed the #Equalpay had some validity and a leg to stand on (shame on me for just assuming). What person would not support equal pay and treatment for women?  i have two daughters, so of course I support that. #Equalpay a handy catch phrase that is easy for uneducated followers to grab on to and support without looking into the somewhat complicated facts. My background is both finance and contracts, and as soon as i looked at the facts, it was clear to me this Equalpay mantra was a scam.
> The WNT players can only bey one of two things,..1) completely lacking any knowledge of what they are doing with respect to CBA structure and value of both their guarantee and benefits compensation that they received in lieu of pay to play, and thus actually think they are in the right in their stance,..or 2) complete crooks and are try to steal money.  Thats the only two possibilities from what I can see,..and as far as I am concerned, both lead to the WNT being poor roll models for our young ladies and women.


Was the WNT attorney bad, or were the facts just completely unfavorable for the WNT?  To lose in summary judgement indicates the facts were overwhelmingly in favor of US Soccer and that even the world's worst PR couldn't overcome the facts.  Facts are certainly more persuasive to a judge than to a jury, relatively speaking.  It doesn't sound like either side's counsel is going down in the legal Hall of Fame.  It makes you wonder even more my US Soccer's counsel felt it necessary to make sexist arguments to substantiate differences in pay when the actual pay was deemed by the Judge to be equal, more or less.


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## MWN (May 4, 2020)

es_surf said:


> MWN, i havent been following this for a long time,..but from reading your posts, it appears you have a legal background?
> Everything you have said is spot on correct, which is why it would appear you have a legal background. Not only is the WNT lawyer bad, but i suspect could be subject to malpractice.
> Like many folks, I ignored the actual details of what was going on here and just assumed the #Equalpay had some validity and a leg to stand on (shame on me for just assuming). What person would not support equal pay and treatment for women?  i have two daughters, so of course I support that. #Equalpay a handy catch phrase that is easy for uneducated followers to grab on to and support without looking into the somewhat complicated facts. My background is both finance and contracts, and as soon as i looked at the facts, it was clear to me this Equalpay mantra was a scam.
> The WNT players can only bey one of two things,..1) completely lacking any knowledge of what they are doing with respect to CBA structure and value of both their guarantee and benefits compensation that they received in lieu of pay to play, and thus actually think they are in the right in their stance,..or 2) complete crooks and are try to steal money.  Thats the only two possibilities from what I can see,..and as far as I am concerned, both lead to the WNT being poor roll models for our young ladies and women.


Its unlikely the lawyer would be subject to malpractice, after all the lawyer and the USWNT PR machine has got Biden and many others fooled.  I can't say their advice deviated from the standard of care AND was the proximate cause of the USWNT suffering damage ... we want advocates to advocate, even if the argument is weak.  The problem is the USWNT's claim for equal pay was and remains at its core intellectually dishonest and that is sad.  The only way the lawyers could potentially be liable is if the Federation is awarded "costs" and "attorneys fees" against the USWNT.  This thing will settle long before that move.


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## Keepermom2 (May 4, 2020)

MWN said:


> Its always been a fact, the WNT never wanted the same deal the men had because the MNT's deal was not guaranteed.  They negotiated a deal with a better downside and less upside.  This has always been my problem with the lawsuit the WNT players made, they cherry picked the elements of the deal they made that could be worse and ignored the elements of the deal that were better.  The law has always been that we look at the "total compensation."
> 
> Analogy: Let's say I need two sales people and I'm offering a commission only.  Male salesperson comes in and say: "I'll take the job, no base salary and a commission of 10%."  Great your hired.  Female salesperson comes in and says: "I can't do commission only."  Ok, what can you do?  "I need a base salary of $100k, health and dental, but I'll take a smaller commission, say 5%."  Hmmm ... we negotiate and arrive at a deal.  A few years later, the Female salesperson sues me for unequal treatment claiming her 5% commission is less than the man's 10% and asks the court to ignore the fact she was paid a guaranteed $100k base with benefits and the man wasn't.
> 
> ...


I honestly presumed there was more and the past years were at play.  From reading the judgement, that wasn't the case.  There is a lot of incorrect information our there but the judgement speaks for itself.  The big thing that turned for me was there was evidence they turned down an equivalent deal.   When I looked at the tax documents for 3/31/19, the top women's players made $312k to $314 so your number is correct.


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## MWN (May 4, 2020)

Keepermom2 said:


> I honestly presumed there was more and the past years were at play.  From reading the judgement, that wasn't the case.  There is a lot of incorrect information our there but the judgement speaks for itself.  The big thing that turned for me was there was evidence they turned down an equivalent deal.   When I looked at the tax documents for 3/31/19, the top women's players made $312k to $314 so your number is correct.


Well, if you have been reading my commentary on this issue from over a year ago (see: https://www.socalsoccer.com/threads/uswnt.708/post-254841) its a point I have been making, the women know what the men's deal was and asked for a deal that was unique to their situation.  It was right of US Soccer to treat them differently as they requested, it was wrong for Alex Morgan and the USWNT union to claim inequality in the deal the union's lawyers negotiated.


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## es_surf (May 4, 2020)

MWN said:


> The problem is the USWNT's claim for equal pay was and remains at its core intellectually dishonest and that is sad.


100%



watfly said:


> Was the WNT attorney bad, or were the facts just completely unfavorable for the WNT?


both.  more than unfavorable,..i cant see the WNT perspective at all. It appears to be a completely fabricated #equalpay lie. i dont know in what world someone lives in where you can be offered two CBA agreements,.you sign the one you think is a best fit for your needs (ie guarantees and benefits), and then when the outcome plays out (ie they won the WWC), then demand to be paid in addition under the other contract that they originally rejected. No man or women ever gets the best of both contracts.  And then claim gender discrimination, under the banner of womens equality to gain the publics sympathy in hopes that they can get US Soccer to cave to the public pressure to settle to give them more money than they are contractually obligated.


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## rainbow_unicorn (May 5, 2020)

The USWNT lawyers should have included performance into the argument.  Yes, they were paid nearly the same but their performance was much higher.


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## chiefs (May 5, 2020)

es_surf said:


> MWN, i havent been following this for a long time,..but from reading your posts, it appears you have a legal background?
> Everything you have said is spot on correct, which is why it would appear you have a legal background. Not only is the WNT lawyer bad, but i suspect could be subject to malpractice.
> Like many folks, I ignored the actual details of what was going on here and just assumed the #Equalpay had some validity and a leg to stand on (shame on me for just assuming). What person would not support equal pay and treatment for women?  i have two daughters, so of course I support that. #Equalpay a handy catch phrase that is easy for uneducated followers to grab on to and support without looking into the somewhat complicated facts. My background is both finance and contracts, and as soon as i looked at the facts, it was clear to me this Equalpay mantra was a scam.
> The WNT players can only bey one of two things,..1) completely lacking any knowledge of what they are doing with respect to CBA structure and value of both their guarantee and benefits compensation that they received in lieu of pay to play, and thus actually think they are in the right in their stance,..or 2) complete crooks and are try to steal money.  Thats the only two possibilities from what I can see,..and as far as I am concerned, both lead to the WNT being poor roll models for our young ladies and women.


And not only that; the legal fees may have sunk or became the final blow of ending DA which effected thousands of kids....


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## MWN (May 5, 2020)

rainbow_unicorn said:


> The USWNT lawyers should have included performance into the argument.  Yes, they were paid nearly the same but their performance was much higher.


Was it?  Was their performance higher than the MNT or was the competition weaker?  If we are looking at performance, then we also need to look at the competitive field, yes?  Should 24 teams in the Women's World Cup be a factor, when the Men's World Cup has 32?  How about the fact that there are 211 Men's teams and only 144 Women's teams that qualified (Worldwide)?  Might the "men" play better or be more motivated if they too had $100k salary from the Federation like the women?  Do we factor that in that the men are paid $0 of guaranteed salary, which is clearly "unequal" compared to the $100k the women get?  How about the fact that in the CONCACAF 28 teams competed for 3.5 slots in the last Women's World Cup (12.5%), whereas 35 teams competed for 3.5 slots in the last Men's World Cup (10%)?  

You do raise an excellent point.  By including performance in the criteria, we can't cherry pick and would have to look all all elements that impact performance and/or results.  The reward is often greater when the process is more difficult.  The reward is also greater when more dollars are at stake.  Ultimately, the USWNT are in an excellent bargaining position, but the better argument for the Women earning the same or more than the USMNT is "value."

By winning in a tournament that pays 10x less then the Men's Tournament, USWNT still bring a greater or equal value to the Federation in the form of TV Rights, Jersey Sales, ticket revenue, etc., because the competitive field is much weaker on the Women's side than the Men's side and this value should translate into guaranteed income and/or a greater share of the income to makeup for prize money discrepancies at the International level.  It is a two edged sword (but extremely low risk).  If the USMNT where to somehow overcome the competitive disadvantage they find themselves in international play and actually make it and win the Men's World Cup, then the value the men bring would be far greater than it currently is (but that isn't going to happen for many, many years).

Right now FIFA ranks (https://www.fifa.com/fifa-world-ranking/) our USMNT at No. 22 (1542 points - Belgium is No. 1 with 1765 (220 pt difference)) whereas the on the Women's side the USWNT is ranked no. 1 (2181 points - Austria is No. 22 1792 points (389 pt difference).  The greater the point difference the "less competitive" the match, so the women have a good "value" argument.


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## espola (May 5, 2020)

MWN said:


> Was it?  Was their performance higher than the MNT or was the competition weaker?  If we are looking at performance, then we also need to look at the competitive field, yes?  Should 24 teams in the Women's World Cup be a factor, when the Men's World Cup has 32?  How about the fact that there are 211 Men's teams and only 144 Women's teams that qualified (Worldwide)?  Might the "men" play better or be more motivated if they too had $100k salary from the Federation like the women?  Do we factor that in that the men are paid $0 of guaranteed salary, which is clearly "unequal" compared to the $100k the women get?  How about the fact that in the CONCACAF 28 teams competed for 3.5 slots in the last Women's World Cup (12.5%), whereas 35 teams competed for 3.5 slots in the last Men's World Cup (10%)?
> 
> You do raise an excellent point.  By including performance in the criteria, we can't cherry pick and would have to look all all elements that impact performance and/or results.  The reward is often greater when the process is more difficult.  The reward is also greater when more dollars are at stake.  Ultimately, the USWNT are in an excellent bargaining position, but the better argument for the Women earning the same or more than the USMNT is "value."
> 
> ...


The points on the male and female sides do not compare that way because, for one thing, there is no competition between the sides to cross-calibrate the values.


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## MWN (May 5, 2020)

espola said:


> The points on the male and female sides do not compare that way because, for one thing, there is no competition between the sides to cross-calibrate the values.


Correct, we have to look at the relative competitive strength of the opponents.  On the women's side, there is a much wider disparity between teams.  For example, there is a +91 point difference between the US Women and Germany (Ranked No. 2), which tells us that the German team is far less of a competitive opponent.  On the men's side the there are 13 teams between No. 22 (USMNT at 1542) and No. 8 (Spain at 1636), which represents a farm more competitive (aka tougher) challenge.

There is an argument that we could achieve parity by eliminating gender based tournaments and just make it COED, eliminate the rule that women cannot play on Men's teams and deal with the religious freedom claims from the theocracies.


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## es_surf (May 5, 2020)

rainbow_unicorn said:


> The USWNT lawyers should have included performance into the argument.  Yes, they were paid nearly the same but their performance was much higher.


re-read MWN response to you. it still applies.
win/loss performance isnt that relevant since their contract was weighted toward a guaranteed structure (per the teams choice when they signed it).

however, lets ignore this and continue...
define "performance"?
I am going to assume by "performance" you mean winning soccer games, and winning the WWC.
As opposed to "performance" being defined by generating revenue (because revenue is how businesses have $ to pay people. given they cant pay people with trophies).
if players should be paid just on winning performance,..then the WNBA players should be paid the same as NBA players. But of course they are not paid the same,..has nothing to do with gender discrimination, its simply due to the WNBA generating far less revenue than the NBA. So until the WNBA can generate similar revenue as the NBA, there will not be pay parity between the two groups.
So in short,..players get paid more because they generate more revenue,..not wins.

The same is happening here. The WNT generates far less revenue on average than the MNT. 
For the women to generate the same revenue as the men, the women need to a) win more, and b) play more revenue generating games.
In recent years the WNT was spectacularly successful, they could not have done any better when measured by wins,..and they generated $50.8mm of revenue during that impressive success.
In the same recent years the MNT could not have done worse, not even qualifying for the MWC,..and yet they still generated 49.8mm of revenue.
So the best possible performing WNT actually does generate 2% more revenue than the worst possible performing MNT.
In that time frame the women were paid 25mm, while the men were paid 19mm. The women were paid 30% more than the men, even though they only generated 2% more revenue.
So technically the women were paid more than the men for each dollar of revenue earned.
Keep in mind, the womens 25mm and the mens 19mm are a bit of an apple to and orange comparison. Because in addition to the womens 25mm, they also received a guarantee and benefits, both of which have material value that you keep forgetting about (which is why the women pushed for the guarantee structure in the first place).
Why was the WNT paid 30% more even though they only generated 2% more revenue? is it because US Soccer is gender discriminating against the men?
No, it happened because 
1), the MNT pay is based upon performance (pay to play percentage contract) and the MNT takes the risk of performance and not US Soccer,.. basically that means if the MNT under perform, they get less of the revenue pie (which is what happened). But if the MNT win, they get more because they took the risk and not US Soccer.
and
2) the WNT has a high probability of generating a revenue target (ie winning). So in US Soccers analysis of what they can pay the WNT in a guarantee, US Soccer can take the risk of offering a higher guarantee pay structure (higher % of revenue) for the women, because the probability is greater that the WNT will generate the revenue needed to cover the guarantee for US Soccer. If the WNT instead lost a lot of games and didnt make the WWC (ie didnt generate much revenue),..then US Soccer would have lost a lot of money because they are still on the hook to pay the WNT their guarantee. Thus in a guarantee structure, US Soccer is taking the performance risk, not the players.,..but as a compensation for US Soccer taking that risk (no one takes risk without reward), if the WNT does well, US Soccer gets that upside,..which upside is what the WNT is now trying to take, after US Soccer took the risk to earn it. 

If you are currently thinking to yourself "yea, the WNBA players deserve to be paid the same as the NBA players because they also win and put a ball into a round hole",.... then I cant help you because you are not living in the real world.


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## outside! (May 6, 2020)

es_surf said:


> If you are currently thinking to yourself "yea, the WNBA players deserve to be paid the same as the NBA players because they also win and put a ball into a round hole",.... then I cant help you because you are not living in the real world.


How does one address the fact that there has been orders of magnitude less investment and support for women's sports over the past decades when compared to men's sports? Seems like an uneven playing field.


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## texanincali (May 6, 2020)

outside! said:


> How does one address the fact that there has been orders of magnitude less investment and support for women's sports over the past decades when compared to men's sports? Seems like an uneven playing field.


Why does it need to address that perception?  Investment comes to organizations that have a strong foundation with big upside growth potential.  Sure, there is initial investment that come when getting something off the ground, but still investors are not charitable, they want a return.  The fact of the matter is, there is minimal return in women's sports, thus investment money just isn't there.  When there is a return to be made in women's sports, investors will be there, just like they are for all businesses.  

The women seem to have an elementary understanding of business and math.  The quotes put out by Turasi, Bird and Rapinoe are embarrassingly unintelligent and do little to help their cause.  I have no issue if the current USWNT players want to view themselves as pioneers and be key players that started something that eventually becomes financially rewarding.  That said, pioneers are never the ones that reap the benefits, its the generations that come after that get the rewards.  This current crop of players seem to want the riches that won't be seen for decades to come.  

This entire thing has backfired on the women.  It's only a matter of time before they have to look themselves in the mirror and admit they almost single handedly threw chaos into youth soccer in the US, but even more so for girls soccer who are now losing prominent clubs.


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## MacDre (May 6, 2020)

texanincali said:


> Why does it need to address that perception?  Investment comes to organizations that have a strong foundation with big upside growth potential.  Sure, there is initial investment that come when getting something off the ground, but still investors are not charitable, they want a return.  The fact of the matter is, there is minimal return in women's sports, thus investment money just isn't there.  When there is a return to be made in women's sports, investors will be there, just like they are for all businesses.
> 
> The women seem to have an elementary understanding of business and math.  The quotes put out by Turasi, Bird and Rapinoe are embarrassingly unintelligent and do little to help their cause.  I have no issue if the current USWNT players want to view themselves as pioneers and be key players that started something that eventually becomes financially rewarding.  That said, pioneers are never the ones that reap the benefits, its the generations that come after that get the rewards.  This current crop of players seem to want the riches that won't be seen for decades to come.
> 
> This entire thing has backfired on the women.  It's only a matter of time before they have to look themselves in the mirror and admit they almost single handedly threw chaos into youth soccer in the US, but even more so for girls soccer who are now losing prominent clubs.


The could be the dumbest shit that I have read in a long time.  Perception?  You can’t even acknowledge the facts.  Who the fuck raised you?


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## texanincali (May 6, 2020)

MacDre said:


> The could be the dumbest shit that I have read in a long time.  Perception?  You can’t even acknowledge the facts.  Who the fuck raised you?


What facts?  Is the lawsuit and summary judgment missing pertinent facts that would change what was presented? Go ahead and give me the facts then.  Just make sure they incorporate at least 4th grade math and business 101 principles...something the USWNT lawsuit was missing from the jump.


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## outside! (May 6, 2020)

texanincali said:


> Why does it need to address that perception?


It is not a perception that there has been minimal investment in women's sports. Over the years there have also been rules against allowing women to play sports. Men's sports have benefited from this bias of investment and rules. It is kind of like compound interest.


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## rainbow_unicorn (May 6, 2020)

MWN said:


> Was it?  Was their performance higher than the MNT or was the competition weaker?


Overall performance was higher.  I don't think USSF could (or would) argue that point.  Looking in hindsight USWNT legal team made some missteps.


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## espola (May 6, 2020)

MWN said:


> Correct, we have to look at the relative competitive strength of the opponents.  On the women's side, there is a much wider disparity between teams.  For example, there is a +91 point difference between the US Women and Germany (Ranked No. 2), which tells us that the German team is far less of a competitive opponent.  On the men's side the there are 13 teams between No. 22 (USMNT at 1542) and No. 8 (Spain at 1636), which represents a farm more competitive (aka tougher) challenge.
> 
> There is an argument that we could achieve parity by eliminating gender based tournaments and just make it COED, eliminate the rule that women cannot play on Men's teams and deal with the religious freedom claims from the theocracies.


We should not discount the possibility that the USA women are as much better than their international competition as the formulas indicate.

Coed soccer leagues I have seen require a minimum number of each gender on the field.  It could be completely coed with 5 men and 5 men in the field and a male and female keepers alternate halves.


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## MSK357 (May 6, 2020)

espola said:


> We should not discount the possibility that the USA women are as much better than their international competition as the formulas indicate.
> 
> Coed soccer leagues I have seen require a minimum number of each gender on the field.  It could be completely coed with 5 men and 5 men in the field and a male and female keepers alternate halves.


So only allow women to play goalie for a half?  lol


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## texanincali (May 6, 2020)

outside! said:


> It is not a perception that there has been minimal investment in women's sports. Over the years there have also been rules against allowing women to play sports. Men's sports have benefited from this bias of investment and rules. It is kind of like compound interest.


Which is my point, why is there a need to address a perception that is really a fact?  No one with half a brain would argue that there is more investment in men's sports.  The reason why might be up for debate, but its really not hard to figure out.  Investment comes when a product is put out to market that generates a) lots of sales and in turn a profit, or b) lots of eyeballs that watch something to bring in advertising revenue.  Men's sports have not benefited from bias or rules, they have benefited because they generate public interest that can be capitalized on from a business perspective.   There is a timeline that goes hand in hand with investment and earnings.  There was no bias against MLS players, but given they have only had 25 years to generate interest is the reason they are paid a fraction of what Premier League players earn, who have benefited from over 100 years of the sport to be ingrained in their culture.  Women's tennis is massively popular and they earn as much as the men in many tournaments, not because of charity, but because the number of people that watch.  

You can try to turn this into a "men's sports were established during a time when women's rights were not what they are today" scenario, but it doesn't hold any water from a business standpoint.  There are a multitude of women centered businesses that formed recently that are widely successful.  Today's influencer businesses are a prime example of this, why?  The answer is simple, because women typically generate more eyeballs and sell more products, thus bringing in advertising dollars and revenue. 

NFL, NBA and MLB players made fractions of what today's players make, that's not up for debate.  Why are the athletes of today paid so much more than they were years ago?  Again, simple answer is they can charge more for tickets, they get multiples more revenue from advertising and sponsors because their product is in front of millions of more eyeballs.  

Could we look back at this USWNT and say they laid the groundwork for women soccer players earning millions of dollars per year in another 20 years, sure, and I hope it happens.  However, they first must be able to sell their product to the general public and in turn bring in the dollars to build a sustainable, profitable business  There will be an investor line a mile long if women's team sports can show there is money to be made, as there should be.  

I want the women to be wildly successful and make as much money as possible.  That only happens when they can build enough interest to sustain a league of their own and grow it to the point where there is enough money involved to be shared amongst investors.  This will never be a $25k salary to a $500k salary in the matter of a few years.  It will be a steady increase that may take 25 years to accomplish.  That seems to go missing on the USWNT that want it all right now.


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## espola (May 6, 2020)

rainbow_unicorn said:


> Overall performance was higher.  I don't think USSF could (or would) argue that point.  Looking in hindsight USWNT legal team made some missteps.


The FIFA rankings formula is set up so that the more important the game, the more points it is worth.  The USA women are so far ahead in the FIFA rankings that second-place Germany would have to beat the USA twice in a World Cup elimination round in order to overcome the gap between them.


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## espola (May 6, 2020)

MSK357 said:


> So only allow women to play goalie for a half?  lol


Fair and balanced.


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## MWN (May 6, 2020)

MacDre said:


> The could be the dumbest shit that I have read in a long time.  Perception?  You can’t even acknowledge the facts.  Who the fuck raised you?


Please be respectful, we can argue and debate without name calling and profanity.


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## MSK357 (May 6, 2020)

espola said:


> It could be completely coed with 5 men and 5 men in the field and a male and female keepers alternate halves.





espola said:


> Fair and balanced.


lol


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## MWN (May 6, 2020)

@espola,

One thought I had was a different "CoEd" format.  How about this:

Option 1: Team is made up of 30 players.  15 men and 15 women.  Each Half is 60 minutes.  Men play one half and women play another half.

Option 2: Keep the existing teams the way they are (women, men and 90 minute halves).  The men play and then the women play a regular game against the various National Teams.  The performance of the Men and Women are then "merged" / averaged with tie breakers being the normal FIFA tiebreakers in bracket play.


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## MWN (May 6, 2020)

rainbow_unicorn said:


> Overall performance was higher.  I don't think USSF could (or would) argue that point.  Looking in hindsight USWNT legal team made some missteps.


The only misstep they made was bringing a lawsuit that claimed unequal pay, when their clients were members of a collective bargaining group that asked for terms material different than their male counterparts.  The legal team should have pressed for settlement much earlier.


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## es_surf (May 6, 2020)

MWN said:


> The only misstep they made was bringing a lawsuit that claimed unequal pay, when their clients were members of a collective bargaining group that asked for terms material different than their male counterparts. The legal team should have pressed for settlement much earlier.


100% correct.
I suspect they tried to press to settle, but US Soccer probably told them it better be a low settlement amount given the WNT only have a 0.0000001% chance of success in their bogus claim.


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## EOTL (May 6, 2020)

es_surf said:


> re-read MWN response to you. it still applies.
> win/loss performance isnt that relevant since their contract was weighted toward a guaranteed structure (per the teams choice when they signed it).
> 
> however, lets ignore this and continue...
> ...


There are problems with your analysis. First, you claim the women generate less revenue than the men. which is just wrong. Even USSF’s financial statements establish the WNT generates more revenue than the MNT during the period relevant to the lawsuit, and the court’s order recognizes this. 

Second, USSF’s (and the court’s since it relied on what USSF was telling it) revenue numbers are deeply flawed because they don’t account for all the revenue that should be apportioned to each team. As I have said many times, the revenue numbers do not account for advertising, which is easily the main source of USSF revenue, and the women unquestionably drive that revenue. USSF’s argument here, though, is that advertising should not count because it “cannot” adequately apportion that revenue to the MNT and WNT because it’s ad deals are package deals that include both the MNT and WNT. But this is a problem of USSF’s own creation and, regardless, it just doesn’t want to do the analysis.

Let me provide an example to illustrate how wrong this is. Let’s say a company owns both an NBA and WNBA team. It decides to only sell season ticket packages that include tickets to both NBA and WNBA games. It then excludes season ticket revenues when it determines the respective values that each team provides when it decides comp because it “cannot” apportion the respective value to each team because they’re package deals. This would lead to the NBA players being grossly underpaid only because the club created a financial structure that excludes a critical source of revenue from the calculation. Similarly, excluding the main source of revenue when determining the WNT’s value is messed up and USSF should not be able to hide behind the process it created to ignore the reality that the WNT is its crown jewel. Selling package deals to Nike and VW is nothing short of a fait accompli.

Regardless, revenue is the wrong number to look at. Rather, you need to use profitability to determine their respective value, and the MNT consistently loses money while the WNT consistently makes money even using USSF’s misogynistic accounting standards. Using revenue and not profit is the same as saying a male sales person who generates $1 million in revenue but charges $300k on his expense account should be paid the same for “equal work” with a woman who generates $1 million but was able to do it despite being deprived any expense account.

Another interesting thing about the court’s order is that it parsed out some of the ways in which USSF probably did discriminate against women, instead of considering the total context as it should have. For example, it included health benefits when determining the women make more than the men, but then it turned around and said the women have a legitimate argument that USSF imposes working conditions that are more likely to make them need it. Well, if there’s a legitimate argument that USSF discriminates by subjecting them to unsafe working conditions, it is axiomatic that there’s a legitimate argument also that it’s not paying enough in benefits to account for that increased risk and therefore underpaying them. Parsing out bits and pieces of what the court seems fair and unfair is the wrong standard by which to be looking at the discrimination issue. Using the salesperson example above, what the court did here is like saying the women sales employee’s claim that she was paid unequally lacks merit because she was was paid the same as the man, but I’ll let you argue to a jury that maybe you should get an expense account going forward. More b.s.


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## MWN (May 6, 2020)

outside! said:


> It is not a perception that there has been minimal investment in women's sports. Over the years there have also been rules against allowing women to play sports. Men's sports have benefited from this bias of investment and rules. It is kind of like compound interest.


@outside!, you raise a point that is very important and should be looked at "objectively."  My position will likely differ than yours, but let's lay it out there:

Are sports and participation in sports important from a societal perspective?  Should we promote investment into sports?

Providing equal opportunities in the areas of health, education, work, housing, and other "necessities" are important.  But is sports a necessity?

I say no way.  Sports is nothing more than entertainment and another form of exercise.  If we are going to use "investment" as a criteria then we must look at the ROI from both a public and private point of view.

*The youth level?  *
While athletics and team sports in general are nice and some could argue they contribute to health, the reality is that sports offers no additional health benefits to the individual that general exercise and fitness do not already meet.  At the amateur and recreational level, sports is simply a form of exercise.  We should strive to provide comparable opportunities to each, especially because of the opportunities at the advanced amateur level for education.  Here girls and boys have had comparable opportunities for many decades.  Both the public and private sectors invest comparably in the girls and boys.

*Advanced amateur level?  *
Title IX addresses access to education through scholarships by ensuring an equal number of scholarships are available to each sex.  This has been the law for nearly the last 50 years and arguably, the reason our USWNT does so much better than the rest of the world has been opportunities to play college soccer in the US, whereas, the rest of the world doesn't tie college teams to education.  So, women have had equal investment for almost two generations (47 years) in the US.  Taken as a whole, both the public and private sectors invest comparably in the women and men.

*Professional level?  *
At the "professional" level, sports is nothing more than entertainment.  The professional level the interest is eye balls, seats in the stands and advertising dollars.  Nothing more and nothing less.  If a professional athlete or team can drive revenue dollars that athlete is paid.   There is no dispute that for the last 100 years, investment in women's team sports has been a failure and league after league after league has failed.  There is also no dispute that 99% of the private sector dollars are invested in men's sports because of the historical ROI.

My reaction to the funding issue is two fold:

1) At the amateur and advanced amateur level (college) and youth, the funding disparity is non-existent for nearly two generations.  There really has not been one.  If anything, women's soccer has benefited 2x versus men due to the scholarship imbalance.

2) At the professional level, "so what!"  It doesn't matter, especially if the investment is being made by the private sector which has every right to invest in businesses that represent a better return.

My biggest problem with the investment and equality issue is that athletes are ultimately paid by the consumers.  I view athletes as simply entertainers, like musicians and actors.  Why would anybody invest in something that has no real impact on our society and won't make them money (no ROI)?  Sports is simply another form of entertainment?  From a societal benefit perspective, there is no difference between Kenny Rogers, Adele, Hope Solo, Peyton Manning, Harrison Ford, Eddie Murphy, Julia Roberts, Christian Pulisic, and any other entertainer.  They exist to play music, act, play games, sing, for our entertainment.  That is it.

They don't educate our children like teachers, they don't cure cancer, create technology, build homes, or do anything of necessity.  Ultimately, they are simply entertainers and should be paid based solely on the entertainment value they bring.


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## texanincali (May 6, 2020)

EOTL said:


> Second, USSF’s (and the court’s since it relied on what USSF was telling it) revenue numbers are deeply flawed because they don’t account for all the revenue that should be apportioned to each team. As I have said many times, the revenue numbers do not account for advertising, which is easily the main source of USSF revenue, and the women unquestionably drive that revenue. USSF’s argument here, though, is that advertising should not count because it “cannot” adequately apportion that revenue to the MNT and WNT because it’s ad deals are package deals that include both the MNT and WNT. But this is a problem of USSF’s own creation and, regardless, it just doesn’t want to do the analysis.
> 
> Let me provide an example to illustrate how wrong this is. Let’s say a company owns both an NBA and WNBA team. It decides to only sell season ticket packages that include tickets to both NBA and WNBA games. It then excludes season ticket revenues when it determines the respective values that each team provides when it decides comp because it “cannot” apportion the respective value to each team because they’re package deals. This would lead to the NBA players being grossly underpaid only because the club created a financial structure that excludes a critical source of revenue from the calculation. Similarly, excluding the main source of revenue when determining the WNT’s value is messed up and USSF should not be able to hide behind the process it created to ignore the reality that the WNT is its crown jewel. Selling package deals to Nike and VW is nothing short of a fait accompli.


I don't think that is a very good analogy at all.  USSF can easily tell the difference between gate receipts of USMNT and USWNT.  What can't be determined is the TV deal that is negotiated for US Soccer broadcast rights and sponsorship money.  The TV deals are negotiated for terms that stretch years and the schedule for each NT is done annually, at most.  Therefore, if one team plays 8 televised games in a year and the other plays 4 televised games in a year, you can't just split up the annualized TV revenue.   A better analogy would be NCAA football where a broadcaster pays $100M annualized to broadcast SEC games.  These deals are put together before schedules are even made and there is no way to separate what value LSU brings to the table versus Ole Miss.  Coming off a WC win, the USWNT's value on TV could be worth many times the value of USMNT who maybe in the first year of a new 4 year cycle.  Value of the USMNT in a World Cup year could be many times that of the USWNT if they are 3 years away from their next world cup.  

You bring up a good point though and its one I would fully support.  Let the USMNT and USWNT fall into separate entities under USSF.  Each can negotiate their own TV deal, their own sponsorship, their own pay structure and their own % of gate receipts.  Do you really think for one second that the USWNT would generate more money than the men?  Do you really think ESPN, FOX and the Spanish broadcasters would offer more money to televise the women more than the men?  Do you really think Nike would pay the women more than the men?  My guess is Christian Pulisic alone has as much value to a Nike or Adidas than the entire USWNT.  Why, because more eyes around the world see him on a weekend playing for Chelsea than see the USWNT in an entire year.  There have already been comparisons on TV ratings, you can look at them yourself and draw your own conclusion.  

If this were truly about equality, the USWNT should demand USSF split the men from the women and let each negotiate their own deals like mentioned above.  I doubt very seriously that would happen though, because they know they would probably earn much less than they do know.  

This entire thing is simple math and business practices.  A court of law does not care about "continue the fight" and "we won't quit" no matter how many times its shouted.  Its time for the women to move on, negotiate a better deal next time or be willing to retire from the USWNT.  There would be a line 10 miles long with young girls willing to take their place.  I have no issue with giving the USWNT the credit for making that line so long.


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## EOTL (May 6, 2020)

watfly said:


> Was the WNT attorney bad, or were the facts just completely unfavorable for the WNT?  To lose in summary judgement indicates the facts were overwhelmingly in favor of US Soccer and that even the world's worst PR couldn't overcome the facts.  Facts are certainly more persuasive to a judge than to a jury, relatively speaking.  It doesn't sound like either side's counsel is going down in the legal Hall of Fame.  It makes you wonder even more my US Soccer's counsel felt it necessary to make sexist arguments to substantiate differences in pay when the actual pay was deemed by the Judge to be equal, more or less.


An interesting thing about the WNT papers is the lack of emphasis on advertising deals as it relates to the WNT’s real value. There are a couple potential reasons. The first is the equal pay claim has very draconian and limited elements that fit very poorly with the reasons the WNT is underpaid due to gender. There is no argument the women were paid more overall and, oversimplifying, that’s what a court looks at with an equal pay claim. It’s possible the attorneys lost the forest among the trees because they (wrong) believed that they were paid less when the lawsuit was filed and lost focus on what turned out to be their better discrimination claim. It is also possible they don’t want to go down that road because someday the MNT might not suck and it could be used against them.

The theory behind the gender discrimination claim is (or should have been), that the WNT is entitled to far more pay commensurate with the value they provide. They looked at the discrimination claim as more of a throwaway at first and seemed ill prepared to deal with it at MSJ because they didn’t conduct the right discovery or ask the right depo questions. They also fell into the trap of using revenue (instead of profitability) as the right number by which to determine value.  They probably also tread lightly with advertisers because they did not want to piss off the golden geese of Nike and VW by seeking to force them to disclose how they value the respective worths of the MNT and WNT.  I suspect they decided it was a better idea to risk losing the case, assuming their attorneys weren’t incompetent. 

Finally, there was a lot that went unsaid about the CBA issues, but I suspect the lawyers also danced around that because WNT lawyers repeatedly botched the timing of the renewal among other aspects of CNA negotiations. Regardless, the idea that the women should be bound to a CBA isn’t a great one for USSF given that the women had far less negotiating power than the men by virtue of the fact that they are women. Negotiating “insurance” as the court called it because that is necessary for the women to survive in an environment in which FIFA and the world have historically (and still) discriminate against women is pretty ridiculous IMO. The reality is the men have more leverage because they make a lot of money from their clubs and don’t need the MNT to make a living, while the women depend greatly on WNT comp. But the fact the men make more outside of the MNT is irrelevant to the issue of how much value they provide to USSF. If anything, the fact that MNT players have so much more opportunity for exposure by virtue of being men but still can’t help USSF profit is embarrassing and more evidence e of discrimination against the women. 

My feeling now is that the WNT burn down the building. There are enough critical players who’ve presumably made enough money now to stand on principle, boycott and cause the WNT to start losing thereby risking the complete collapse of USSF’s advertising revenue in a way that does not jeopardize the short term comp under the CBA for those who can’t afford to boycott. There are probably 6-8 WNT regulars who can probably risk that they’ll never play another WNT game if they boycott right before the Olympics, and they may be able to pressure high others so that USSF can’t hold it against them permanently. Nike and VW know why they get value from their contracts, as does USSF.


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## MWN (May 6, 2020)

EOTL said:


> There are problems with your analysis. First, you claim the women generate less revenue than the men. which is just wrong. Even USSF’s financial statements establish the WNT generates more revenue than the MNT during the period relevant to the lawsuit, and the court’s order recognizes this.
> 
> Second, USSF’s (and the court’s since it relied on what USSF was telling it) revenue numbers are deeply flawed because they don’t account for all the revenue that should be apportioned to each team. As I have said many times, the revenue numbers do not account for advertising, which is easily the main source of USSF revenue, and the women unquestionably drive that revenue. USSF’s argument here, though, is that advertising should not count because it “cannot” adequately apportion that revenue to the MNT and WNT because it’s ad deals are package deals that include both the MNT and WNT. But this is a problem of USSF’s own creation and, regardless, it just doesn’t want to do the analysis.
> 
> ...


@EOTL and @es_surf,

You are both wrong and going down the wrong path and clearly, neither of you have taken the time to read the full text of the Court's analysis of the 2017 CBA.  The current contract that the USMNT have with USSF does not take into account revenue or value that either team brings to the Federation, unless that revenue is ticket sales and/or prize money.  The women have a different deal under the 2017 CBA.

Because the court was only looking at a specific time period (pre-2017 CBA) It would be wholly improper for the Court in this matter to include value factors outside of the CBA in consideration of the Equal Pay claims.  

For the time period at hand the fundamental problem, is that the USMNT contract was rejected by the WNT (technically the Women's National Team Player's Association) on November 1, 2012, when it demanded the following benefits that the men did not have in their contract:

27 players under contract and paid a salary;
injury protection;
severance for all players
dental insurance
an agreed upon number of games
a set amount of break time for salaried players; and,
day care for matches.
One of the reasons the WNT wanted the above was because the WNT represents the US in both the Olympics and the FIFA World Cup.  The MNT only represents the USA in the World Cup, the U23 MNT plays in the Olympics, thus, there would be more USSF games for the WNT players.

The other reason the WNT wanted the above, especially the salary element was because there was no viable privately funded professional league at the time, the two previous attempts had failed miserably due to the economic non-viability of professional women's team sports.  At the time of the 2012 negotiations, the Federation had informed of its desire to support a new league.

So nobody is confused, the WNT expressly asked for an ultimately received a completely different deal than the MNT because the WNT wanted to eliminate the risks that the MNT played under.  They did not want the same deal, they rejected that deal.

After much negotiation, on February 20, 2013, the USSF emailed a counter proposal.  The emailed recognized the position of the WNTPA which was to ...reflect the priorities as expressed by the WNTPA, namely to increase the guaranteed compensation at the expense of the non-guaranteed compensation (the bonus payments)."

All along it was the intent of the WNT to take less in the bonus front and take more in the "guaranteed compensation" front.  So both of you looking at revenue and value brought in in the form of advertising are examining revenue that the WNT players (and the MNT players) never asked for.

In the world of the law ... we call that "irrelevant."

*BUT REJOICE ... the WNT has already clawed back some "Value" in the 2017 CBA.*

In 2016, the WNT went back to the bargaining table for their second CBA.  Again (let me restate this, AGAIN) the WNT demanded "MAG" (Minimum Annual Guaranteed) compensation that was tied to both play on the National Team and the NWSL, but this time also to be paid under the same bonus structure.

The  WNT wanted "all the upside plus the elimination of risk."  What was the upside?

Guaranteed minimum compensation (which the MNT does not have).
Automatic increases in compensation if the MNT compensation increases (which the MNT does not have).
a guaranteed number of players contracted each calendar year (which the MNT does not have).
injury guarantees (which the MNT does not have).
Pregnancy guarantees (which the MNT does not have ... including family leave).
Severance (which the MNT does not have).
Post-Termination Health Insurance (which the MNT does not have).
Retirement benefits (which the MNT does not have).
Significant financial support of a professional league (which the MNT does not have).
*This is where I need both of you to read very, very carefully ...:*

Ultimately, the parties USSF and WNT agreed and compromised and entered into a new CBA, which provides for bonuses for Olympic qualifying, bonuses for medaling, NWSL bonuses, guaranteed minimum compensation, one-time signing bonus of $230,000, ticket revenue share of $1.50 per ticket, $5k bonus for She Believes and Four Nations Tournament win, severance, injury protection, health, dental and vision, pregnancy pay, guaranteed rest time, child care assistance, *partnership bonus for exceeding Sum gross revenue targets, bonus for increased viewership, annual payment in exchange for USSF's commercial use of player likeness;* and, a clause that the USSF will schedule a minimum number of WNT games. (_source, Page 13 and 14 of Summary Judgment Opinion_)

NONE, and I mean NONE of the above are in the USMNT CBA.  But the stuff in red (above) is all about the enhanced value the WNT brings in the form of advertising value.

So as of 2017, the USWNT is rewarded for exceeding revenue targets, increased viewership, and use of their commercial likeness ... and they get more per game ticket.

*So what is next?*

I suppose if we follow the WNT team standard, which is to _cry about stuff that they could have negotiated in an arms length deal_, the USMNT should sue the Federation on the same grounds of Unequal Pay claiming the women are being treated better than the boys because the women are compensated based on additional value they bring to the Federation ... and they should be allowed to retroactive fix their contract.

Let's go boys, sue!!! 

Or not, and live with the contract you negotiated like big boys and girls.


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## EOTL (May 6, 2020)

texanincali said:


> I don't think that is a very good analogy at all.  USSF can easily tell the difference between gate receipts of USMNT and USWNT.  What can't be determined is the TV deal that is negotiated for US Soccer broadcast rights and sponsorship money.  The TV deals are negotiated for terms that stretch years and the schedule for each NT is done annually, at most.  Therefore, if one team plays 8 televised games in a year and the other plays 4 televised games in a year, you can't just split up the annualized TV revenue.   A better analogy would be NCAA football where a broadcaster pays $100M annualized to broadcast SEC games.  These deals are put together before schedules are even made and there is no way to separate what value LSU brings to the table versus Ole Miss.  Coming off a WC win, the USWNT's value on TV could be worth many times the value of USMNT who maybe in the first year of a new 4 year cycle.  Value of the USMNT in a World Cup year could be many times that of the USWNT if they are 3 years away from their next world cup.
> 
> You bring up a good point though and its one I would fully support.  Let the USMNT and USWNT fall into separate entities under USSF.  Each can negotiate their own TV deal, their own sponsorship, their own pay structure and their own % of gate receipts.  Do you really think for one second that the USWNT would generate more money than the men?  Do you really think ESPN, FOX and the Spanish broadcasters would offer more money to televise the women more than the men?  Do you really think Nike would pay the women more than the men?  My guess is Christian Pulisic alone has as much value to a Nike or Adidas than the entire USWNT.  Why, because more eyes around the world see him on a weekend playing for Chelsea than see the USWNT in an entire year.  There have already been comparisons on TV ratings, you can look at them yourself and draw your own conclusion.
> 
> ...


Absolutely TV providers will offer the women more money than the men. The WNT averaged 929k tv viewers a game from 2015-2019. I’m not going to do the math, but the men have averaged the following per year: 2015 728k, 2016 965k, 2017 819k, 2018 (wait for it) 431k and 2018 737k. Also consider the viewer demographic. People who watch WNT games have way more buying power overall.

Starting from an assumption that more people would watch the MNT than the WNT without even bothering to look into the reality is pretty misogynistic. The fact is the women generate more tv viewership, generate more ticket revenue, they are responsible for more ad revenue, and are far more responsible for earning FIFA WC qualifying comp. And they generate pride for our country while the MNT is a national embarrassment.  I can’t think of a single metric by which the men outperform the women, whether it’s on the financial statements, the field, tv, the backs of souvenir jerseys, or anywhere. The mere fact that Christen Press can sell an autographed jersey at auction for more than every single player on the MNT combined tells you pretty much everything you need to know.


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## texanincali (May 6, 2020)

EOTL said:


> Absolutely TV providers will offer the women more money than the men. The WNT averaged 929k tv viewers a game from 2015-2019. I’m not going to do the math, but the men have averaged the following per year: 2015 728k, 2016 965k, 2017 819k, 2018 (wait for it) 431k and 2018 737k. Also consider the viewer demographic. People who watch WNT games have way more buying power overall.


I would agree with you if those were the only numbers to take into consideration.  It’s tough to compare a cycle with 2 World Cups (women) versus a cycle with 0 World Cups (men).  That said, it’s a great negotiating tool for the women.

However, like most things in this debacle, not all the information is being considered.  The average viewership on all channels for USMNT friendlies in 2019 (a year after failing to make the World Cup) was 1.27 million.  The average viewership on all channels for USWNT friendlin 2019 (post World Cup) was 295k.  Those numbers aren’t even close.

To be fair, the women had great numbers in the World Cup and could easily use the nearly guaranteed participation in World Cups to negotiate a better deal.  If you compared the viewership in apples to apples cycles (4 years when each team played in a World Cup) then men’s numbers are much more than the women.

Again, I would fully support the USWNT negotiating their own TV deal, but to think their deal would be worth than the men’s is just not reality.


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## EOTL (May 6, 2020)

MWN said:


> @EOTL and @es_surf,
> 
> You are both wrong and going down the wrong path and clearly, neither of you have taken the time to read the full text of the Court's analysis of the 2017 CBA.  The current contract that the USMNT have with USSF does not take into account revenue or value that either team brings to the Federation, unless that revenue is ticket sales and/or prize money.  The women have a different deal under the 2017 CBA.
> 
> ...


Ooh underlining. I have read the order. I have read the motion papers. I have read everything filed in this case and a lot of things that weren’t, including discovery. As an attorney, you know that courts often get it wrong, and this is one of those instances. Whether it’s because the judge is a Bush appointee, and idiot, or the WNT attorneys didn’t litigate this very well, or some combination of the above is debatable.

I get your argument there is no discrimination because the women got what they agreed to in the CBA. But I also get why that’s wrong, which I have explained it in detail. The women agreed to a CBA they didn’t like because they have less bargaining power than the men solely by virtue of the fact that they are women. If an employer offers a woman a job that underpays her relative to her male peers for their respective values, it is not a defense to a gender discrimination claim that “she signed the contract and therefore agreed to the discrimination.” It doesn’t matter whether it’s a contract for one women or a group of them. That’s only relevant to class cert, not liability. 

In the end, we’ll see how this goes at both the 9th  and with advertisers. The WNT attorneys have put so much time into this, and the principle of the matter for their clients probably makes it inevitable that the 9th will ultimately issue a ruling unless it settles for a ton of money despite the district court ruling. And we both know how the 9th is likely to go. Despite Trump, it still has a majority of liberals.


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## MacDre (May 6, 2020)

MWN said:


> Please be respectful, we can argue and debate without name calling and profanity.


I was responding in kind.  You can use nice words and still be disrespectful.  Buddy, I’m keeping it real!


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## EOTL (May 6, 2020)

texanincali said:


> I would agree with you if those were the only numbers to take into consideration.
> 
> However, like most things in this debacle, not all the information is being considered.  The average viewership on all channels for USMNT friendlies in 2019 (a year after failing to make the World Cup) was 1.27 million.  The average viewership on all channels for USWNT friendlin 2019 (post World Cup) was 295k.  Those numbers aren’t even close.
> 
> ...


Huh? The cycle included a WC for both. You’re arguing the women don’t deserve more for their greater profitability because the men sucked so bad that they were unprofitable. You’re arguing that it would be unfair to the men to let the women get credit for actually accomplishing something they couldn’t - massive tv ratings and profitability resulting from their success and qualification for the WC?  You are doing what all misogynists do, which is blithely dismiss the very things that make the women more profitable. Because if we don’t count all the things that make the WNT better and more profitable, then they aren’t better and more profitable.

My god, you’re essentially arguing that a male sales person should be paid as much as his female counterpart because he might have been able to generate the same sales as her if he weren’t so f**king incompetent. But let’s not hold that incompetence and lack of profitability against him because, you know, maybe he’ll get his act together someday and do what we assume men should be able to do, which is to be better than women at earning money for the company.

Please find me one actual metric by which the men do better than the women. It isn’t ticket revenue. It’s not tv viewership. It isn’t ad revenue. It isn’t success in the field. It isn’t profit. And don’t tell me that Michael Bradley deserves more money than the women because Landon Donovan used to generate tv viewership.


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## outside! (May 6, 2020)

MWN said:


> @outside!, you raise a point that is very important and should be looked at "objectively."  My position will likely differ than yours, but let's lay it out there:
> 
> Are sports and participation in sports important from a societal perspective?  Should we promote investment into sports?
> 
> ...


So you see no value in advertising things that are beneficial to the public good? In general, Americans need to exercise more. How do you calculate the health cost savings of more people participating in sports? Trying to get everybody to just workout at the gym or go for a jog will not work very well.

Since most youth sports leagues use public facilities, one could argue that even in the past 20 years there has been unequal investment toward boys sport (DA existed long before GDA for instance which probably violated CA AB 2404 Fair Play Act).


MWN said:


> *Advanced amateur level?  *
> Title IX addresses access to education through scholarships by ensuring an equal number of scholarships are available to each sex.  This has been the law for nearly the last 50 years and arguably, the reason our USWNT does so much better than the rest of the world has been opportunities to play college soccer in the US, whereas, the rest of the world doesn't tie college teams to education.  So, women have had equal investment for almost two generations (47 years) in the US.  Taken as a whole, both the public and private sectors invest comparably in the women and men.


Title IX does not mandate and equal number of scholarships. The number of scholarships available required for each gender can be calculated several ways, none of which require and equal number of scholarships for men and women. Since there are more women undergraduates than men, an argument could be made that women deserve more scholarships than men. There are no schools that offer 85 full ride scholarships to women, most women's scholarships are partial scholarships.



MWN said:


> *Professional level?  *
> At the "professional" level, sports is nothing more than entertainment.  The professional level the interest is eye balls, seats in the stands and advertising dollars.  Nothing more and nothing less.  If a professional athlete or team can drive revenue dollars that athlete is paid.   There is no dispute that for the last 100 years, investment in women's team sports has been a failure and league after league after league has failed.  There is also no dispute that 99% of the private sector dollars are invested in men's sports because of the historical ROI.
> 
> My reaction to the funding issue is two fold:
> ...


There is a scholarship imbalance. _Male_ athletes _receive_ $133 million _more athletic scholarship_ dollars than _female_ athletes each year. https://www.athleticscholarships.net/title-ix-college-athletics-5.htm



MWN said:


> 2) At the professional level, "so what!"  It doesn't matter, especially if the investment is being made by the private sector which has every right to invest in businesses that represent a better return.


Not all investment in professional sports have been private sector. Most professional sports stadiums were built with taxpayer dollars, and most have lost money for the communities they are located in.


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## MWN (May 6, 2020)

EOTL said:


> Ooh underlining. I have read the order. I have read the motion papers. I have read everything filed in this case and a lot of things that weren’t, including discovery. As an attorney, you know that courts often get it wrong, and this is one of those instances. Whether it’s because the judge is a Bush appointee, and idiot, or the WNT attorneys didn’t litigate this very well, or some combination of the above is debatable.
> 
> I get your argument there is no discrimination because the women got what they agreed to in the CBA. But I also get why that’s wrong, which I have explained it in detail. The women agreed to a CBA they didn’t like because they have less bargaining power than the men solely by virtue of the fact that they are women. If an employer offers a woman a job that underpays her relative to her male peers for their respective values, it is not a defense to a gender discrimination claim that “she signed the contract and therefore agreed to the discrimination.” It doesn’t matter whether it’s a contract for one women or a group of them. That’s only relevant to class cert, not liability.
> 
> In the end, we’ll see how this goes at both the 9th  and with advertisers. The WNT attorneys have put so much time into this, and the principle of the matter for their clients probably makes it inevitable that the 9th will ultimately issue a ruling unless it settles for a ton of money despite the district court ruling. And we both know how the 9th is likely to go. Despite Trump, it still has a majority of liberals.


Why do they have less bargaining power?

Where I suspect we disagree is that I reject the notion that the Federation is responsible for curing market forces it did not create.   The Women's World Cup only officially began in 1991, due in part to the USSF's support.  Both the WNT and Federation attempted to compensate for those market forces by giving the WNT a guaranteed deal and different bonuses, which was further refined in the 2017 deal. The Federation should be applauded and not lambasted.  The FIFA World Cup prize money at the time the 2017 CBA was being negotiated was about $2M for the winner.  The WNT wanted bonuses that exceeded what the Federation would have received.  

Ultimately, the USWNT would have lost because the Federation's defense was about as airtight as it could be because of the quantity/quality exception.  SEC. 206, (d) (Prohibition of sex discrimination), provides:


> (1) No employer having employees subject to any provisions of this section shall discriminate, within any establishment in which such employees are employed, between employees on the basis of sex by paying wages to employees in such establishment at a rate less than the rate at which he pays wages to employees of the opposite sex in such establishment for equal work on jobs the performance of which requires equal skill, effort, and responsibility, and which are performed under similar working conditions, except where such payment is made pursuant to (i) a seniority system; (ii) a merit system; (iii) a system which measures earnings by quantity or quality of production; or (iv) a differential based on any other factor other than sex: _Provided_, That an employer who is paying a wage rate differential in violation of this subsection shall not, in order to comply with the provisions of this subsection, reduce the wage rate of any employee.


The production of "prize" money would fall under this exception, the quantity of prize money produced by the team/players is precisely what the Federation's reason for paying the players differently was based on, and a factor the court never had to consider because undisputed testimony was before the Court that the average pay to the women's players was more than the average pay to the men.

But if we consider that it wasn't, and let's just say the women did not win the World Cup and the men Won the whole enchilada during the period under review and the men received $2M average salary and the women only $150k, the Federation would have likely still prevailed at trial because of the quantity/quality exception that is in the statute.

Ultimately though it would be awesome if FIFA, who controls the tournament, could get it to the same level economically as the Men's World Cup and treat the prize money the same, but that will not cure the fundamental defect that consumers have limited entertainment dollars to spend and tend to spend those entertainment dollars on entertainment that represents the highest form, which is why the Premier League makes a magnitude more than the MLS.


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## EOTL (May 6, 2020)

MWN said:


> Why do they have less bargaining power?
> 
> Where I suspect we disagree is that I reject the notion that the Federation is responsible for curing market forces it did not create.   The Women's World Cup only officially began in 1991, due in part to the USSF's support.  Both the WNT and Federation attempted to compensate for those market forces by giving the WNT a guaranteed deal and different bonuses, which was further refined in the 2017 deal. The Federation should be applauded and not lambasted.  The FIFA World Cup prize money at the time the 2017 CBA was being negotiated was about $2M for the winner.  The WNT wanted bonuses that exceeded what the Federation would have received.
> 
> ...


They have less bargaining power because they do not have an alternate source of revenue and cannot hold out. Unlike the men, who earn a ton of money from other sources and don’t need the MNT to make a living, the women do. It is not USSF’s fault that the men have more opportunity in a misogynistic world, but it does not mean USSF can perpetuate it by paying the women less than their relative value to USSF. For the women, it is a matter of having to take what they are offered, or not make a living.

Stated differently, *external* market forces that USSF did not create have absolutely no relevance to the *internal* market forces that determine the value the WNT players provide to USSF. It doesn’t matter how much FIFA makes off men’s soccer worldwide. It doesn’t matter that in every country in the world but one the MNTs are more valuable to their federation than their WNT. What matters is how much value the WNT players provide to USSF’s bottom line compared to the MNT.  And no one yet has provided any actual evidence that the MNT remotely approaches what the WNT does in that regard. No one can make a legitimate argument that the men bring in more profit from tv, advertising, ticket sales, or anything. They don’t and the numbers prove that

If the women had equal bargaining power with the men, this would be easy. The women would just hold out until USSF was crushed under the weight of the advertising losses that would result from it. But the WNT players can’t pull the trigger because they need to eat, USSF knows it, and USSF uses the leverage of external forces (aka the entire history of misogyny worldwide) to negotiate deals in which it pays the women as little as possible rather than what they are worth.

As for prize money, that isn’t something the MNT earns. It goes to the Federations, not teams, and there is nothing that says that money must be designated to MNT players. Taking prize money that is so much greater for the men based on an entire world history of misogyny and the applying it to the MNT just for qualifying only perpetuates misogyny.  There is no reason that money should not be shared equally with the WNT. Some of it goes to pay USSF staff and other admin personnel for goodness sake, and they aren’t on the MNT.

But if you look at the prize money the women receive, they are woefully shorted by FIFA because the USWNT is single-handedly responsible for the WWC’s very existence but most of the money goes to other federations. There would be no WWC without the WNT, and every country in the world and also FIFA owes the WNT a huge debt of gratitude for the money they receive by virtue of the WNT’s awesomeness. But FIFA’s failure to properly compensate the WNT for its role generating revenue for FIFA doesn’t mean USSF should (or even may) take money FIFA provides it for WC qualification by the men and then give most of it to them because ”that’s the way the world is.”


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## es_surf (May 6, 2020)

MWN said:


> You are both wrong and going down the wrong path and clearly, neither of you have taken the time to read the full text of the Court's analysis of the 2017 CBA. The current contract that the USMNT have with USSF does not take into account revenue or value that either team brings to the Federation, unless that revenue is ticket sales and/or prize money. The women have a different deal under the 2017 CBA.


if my message comes across as saying the MNT compensation is based directly on a calculation to revenue, then i should have been clearer. it is indeed not. i was just doing my own analysis based upon how i would analyze (as a % of revenue comparison to the men) to come to my own conclusion. it gets to the same conclusion the judge came to, that the claim has no basis.
i did read 2/3 of the analysis but frankly lawyers are not known for their math and analytic ability, so i was not trying to replicate the courts analysis as its not how i would have looked at it.






:


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## es_surf (May 7, 2020)

es_surf said:


> if my message comes across as saying the MNT compensation is based directly on a calculation to revenue, then i should have been clearer. it is indeed not. i was just doing my own analysis based upon how i would analyze (as a % of revenue comparison to the men) to come to my own conclusion. it gets to the same conclusion the judge came to, that the claim has no basis.
> i did read 2/3 of the analysis but frankly lawyers are not known for their math and analytic ability, so i was not trying to replicate the courts analysis as its not how i would have looked at it.


btw, just to clarify for the math nerds. the reason i used a % of revenue analysis here as my basis for comparison, is because the WNT and MNT made essentially the same revenue over the period of analysis (50.9mm vs 49.9mm) and i am just assuming they have similar expense ratios (before compensation).
if the two groups made materially different revenue or had materially different expenses, it would likely not work. For example, i suspect if i did it with the WNBA vs the NBA, the WNBA would likely have a much higher expense ratio (before compensation) on their business vs the NBA. The result of this means there would be less dollars available after non compensation expenses to pay the ladies, so it would probably show the WNBA women being paid 25 cents on every dollar of revenue vs the men making 60 cents of each dollar of revenue, and would not be as relevant a measure. 

there is probably many ways to do the analysis in the WNT case to get a feel if they are paid reasonably. But since the WNT argument is so weak in multiple ways even beyond the math, it not hard to see that their argument is phony.


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## MWN (May 7, 2020)

EOTL said:


> ...  Stated differently, *external* market forces that USSF did not create have absolutely no relevance to the *internal* market forces that determine the value the WNT players provide to USSF. It doesn’t matter how much FIFA makes off men’s soccer worldwide. It doesn’t matter that in every country in the world but one the MNTs are more valuable to their federation than their WNT. What matters is how much value the WNT players provide to USSF’s bottom line compared to the MNT.  And no one yet has provided any actual evidence that the MNT remotely approaches what the WNT does in that regard. No one can make a legitimate argument that the men bring in more profit from tv, advertising, ticket sales, or anything. They don’t and the numbers prove that
> 
> If the women had equal bargaining power with the men, this would be easy. The women would just hold out until USSF was crushed under the weight of the advertising losses that would result from it. But the WNT players can’t pull the trigger because they need to eat, USSF knows it, and USSF uses the leverage of external forces (aka the entire history of misogyny worldwide) to negotiate deals in which it pays the women as little as possible rather than what they are worth.
> ...


All of what you said is fine and good for the next round of negotiations in 2021/22.  When the courts and parties are looking at things like fairness, equality, bargaining power, etc., its through the historical lens of the time when the negotiations were taking place.  In 2012, the Women's World Cup was not financially significant to FIFA or the Federation.  But like some investments, it has grown and grown.

The Federation at the time created a model that was significantly different than the men's deal.  If the Federation was truly interested in perpetuating inequality it would have dug its heals into the ground and said the WNT gets the same deal as the MNT, but it didn't.  It recognized there was no viable league to grow as players as the other 2 attempts folded.  It agreed give the WNT salaries, bonuses for playing in the NWSL, health insurance, etc.

All at a time where there was questions as to whether the US would receive a return on its investment.

In 2017, the Federation saw the Women were popular.  Gave them additional concessions to provide bonuses for exceeding marketing goals.

If the argument is we go back in time with the advantage of hindsight and retroactively change the deal, I can't get on board.  If the argument is that we sit down now and renegotiate the CBA moving forward in light of changed circumstances that have resulted in "better" results, then great, but we have a problem.

The WNT has refused to sit down and renegotiate unless the Federation agrees to give them retroactive compensation based on a fiction of what they might have received under the men's deal, which they rejected.  That is wrong and bad faith.

Employees are never in an equal bargaining position with the employer, which is why unions exist to help level it out a bit.  The WNT's bargaining power has grown and is growing and likely more powerful than the MNT.

The problem for the Federation is that it is a two-edged sword and if they give the WNT more than the men then they expose themselves to a lawsuit for unequal pay by the MNT.


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## rainbow_unicorn (May 7, 2020)

es_surf said:


> 100% correct.
> I suspect they tried to press to settle, but US Soccer probably told them it better be a low settlement amount given the WNT only have a 0.0000001% chance of success in their bogus claim.


I thought there was a $9M number initially offered.  I guess the USWNT didn't like that number and rolled the dice?


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## Keepermom2 (May 7, 2020)

As I read posts from several people (pretty sure most are men), I am struct how people are arguing the value of women (generally speaking).  I appreciate you are not considering that is the number one battle women have had to fight back to the right to vote, to the right to work in executive business positions etc.  By the way, I respect most of the posters.  This isn't an argument.  I would just like to add some information for thought.

For the last several years, men have argued that women do not bring in enough revenue to justify equal pay and then all were shocked that they actually do.  Then men started arguing this point and that point as to why they shouldn't be paid equal.  Interestingly, if women had to justify their value when there was no basis to do so, the women's movement would not be where it is today because there was no history.  You have to invest to achieve returns and returns take time.

The ability of women in sports to generate revenue has been the number one argument since the arguments over Title IX.  Had that been considered during the implementation of Title IX, we wouldn't be where we are today in Women's soccer and Title IX wouldn't have passed and we wouldn't be where we are today in women's sports.

The women's national soccer team have had to fight all the way..".From its inception in 1985, the public responded to the USWNT with an attitude of inferiority. The USSF ultimately allowed for the formation of the team solely to avoid a lawsuit, not out of interest in promoting women’s soccer.  In its early stages, the USSF made it very clear that it did not think the squad was a legitimate professional enterprise, with players earning no salary. The USSF only provided players ten dollars a day in meal money."

"Despite its slow start, the team stayed together long enough for the announcement that FIFA planned to launch the first ever women’s soccer world championship in 1991. FIFA opted to call it the M&Ms Cup, after the tournament’s sponsor, rather than the FIFA World Cup, in case the event flopped, highlighting the inferior treatment that the women’s game received. FIFA also decided that the games in the women’s championships would only last eighty minutes, believing women were incapable of possessing the stamina to play a full ninety minutes.  Such thinking echoes the fears of physical educators in the mid-twentieth century and resembles policies of moderation."

"The U.S. Women’s National Team fought its way to the final of this initial event. The squad faced off against Norway in front of sixty-three thousand fans, at the time the largest crowd to ever watch a women’s soccer game. The U.S. prevailed, defeating Norway, 2-1, to win FIFA’s M&M’s Cup, bringing the first Women’s World Cup title back to the United States. Soccer officials and family members made up the welcome reception for the team; no media attended the return."

The reality is, the women's team now brings in more revenue and the potential for growth in the sport here in the US is huge because women's soccer in the US does not have to compete with American football.  Look at what the women's national team has accomplished since 1985.


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## es_surf (May 7, 2020)

hopefully this will be my last post. i enjoy mathematical puzzles, so this one got me intrigued and sucked in. its been interesting to think thru the math. 

i will leave you guys with a couple last things
when you have a theory about WNT and MNT and economics,..if its investing money that you think it needs or if they are paid well or anything like that,...first test your theory instead on the WNBA and the NBA. I think its the perfect test case for your analysis. 
The NBA gave birth to the WNBA 23 years ago. Its its baby, and they are motivated to see it succeed, they have the money to invest (to the extent they think its worth it) and have had 23 years to do so.
Remember how much the NBA advertised the WNBA during prime time finals NBA games and playoffs etc? "We got next!" That was not free to do vs selling that advertising time to someone else.
After 23 years, the WNBA now generates about $60mm in revenue while the NBA generates 120 times more revenue at $7.6B.
It would be very hard for the women to argue gender discrimination, or that they dont invest enough money, or in any way want to hold back the WNBA growth against the parent who gave birth to them and invested so much time and money.

Here is a fascinating web page I just found that goes through the comparisons of the two businesses and the math:









						NBA vs WNBA: Revenue, Salaries, Attendance, Ratings
					

How does the WNBA stack against the NBA in terms of revenue, salaries, attendance and ratings? WSN launches into a comparison of the NBA and the WNBA!




					www.wsn.com
				




check out my above post guess at the WNBA and NBA player % of revenue (25% and 60%), vs what this article states it is,..(20% and 50%). 
I dont want to toot my own horn,..but "TOOT TOOT!!"


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## EOTL (May 7, 2020)

es_surf said:


> hopefully this will be my last post. i enjoy mathematical puzzles, so this one got me intrigued and sucked in. its been interesting to think thru the math.
> 
> i will leave you guys with a couple last things
> when you have a theory about WNT and MNT and economics,..if its investing money that you think it needs or if they are paid well or anything like that,...first test your theory instead on the WNBA and the NBA. I think its the perfect test case for your analysis.
> ...


You seem to be making a straw man argument.  No one is claiming NWSL players should make as much as MLS players. This is just a deflection from the real issue, which is that USSF should pay the women more than the men because, unlike in your WNBA/NBA example, the WNT *actually* *is* responsible for more revenue and profit.

This argument just reaks of misogyny. You went out and found a place where women don’t bring in as much revenue as the men to justify why women who actually do outperform their male peers financially still deserve to be paid less. This may be the stupidest of many stupid arguments to rationalize why the WNT players should not be paid what they’re worth.


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## outside! (May 7, 2020)

EOTL said:


> You seem to be making a straw man argument.  No one is claiming NWSL players should make as much as MLS players. This is just a deflection from the real issue, which is that USSF should pay the women more than the men because, unlike in your WNBA/NBA example, the WNT *actually* *is* responsible for more revenue and profit.
> 
> This argument just reaks of misogyny. You went out and found a place where women don’t bring in as much revenue as the men to justify why women who actually do outperform their male peers financially still deserve to be paid less. This may be the stupidest of many stupid arguments to rationalize why the WNT players should not be paid what they’re worth.


There is one other flaw with the argument, the comparison of soccer to basketball. Soccer is the most popular game in the world and the potential for growth in the US is much greater than it is for basketball. Soccer is also more relatable than basketball since players can be of average build and still play at the highest levels. Basketball is a great sport, but it will never reach the popularity levels of soccer.


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## whatithink (May 7, 2020)

I have to admit to being somewhat mystified by the back & forth here. The facts are pretty simple and the judge ruled on the facts, based on the contracts the players negotiated and the versions of the contracts offered during the negotiations. The judge also allowed the WNT to proceed with the pieces which appeared discriminatory, but outside the contractual relationships.

The WNT were offered the same contract as the MNT and rejected it. So there's no gender discrimination. They generated more revenue in the period in question and got paid more in the period in question. Both were marginal but probably equate. They could have had a bigger upside with a different agreement ... but they didn't have a different agreement! 

If the WNT now feel they have greater worth and deserve a better deal, then have at it and negotiate that. You can't go back, though, and say I want everything I had plus I want all the upside from a different contract that I rejected.


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## es_surf (May 7, 2020)

EOTL said:


> You seem to be making a straw man argument.  No one is claiming NWSL players should make as much as MLS players. This is just a deflection from the real issue, which is that USSF should pay the women more than the men because, unlike in your WNBA/NBA example, the WNT *actually* *is* responsible for more revenue and profit.
> 
> This argument just reaks of misogyny. You went out and found a place where women don’t bring in as much revenue as the men to justify why women who actually do outperform their male peers financially still deserve to be paid less. This may be the stupidest of many stupid arguments to rationalize why the WNT players should not be paid what they’re worth.


correct, the WNT did make more revenue
but the WNT was actually paid more than the MNT for making more revenue, and i stated so in my original post. 
if i have flawed data, happy to stand corrected

WNT revenue was $50.9mm and the players were paid $25mm (49% of revenue) 
MNT revenue was $49.9mm and the players were paid $19mm (37% of revenue)


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## EOTL (May 7, 2020)

es_surf said:


> correct, the WNT did make more revenue
> but the WNT was actually paid more than the MNT for making more revenue, and i stated so in my original post.
> if i have flawed data, happy to stand corrected
> 
> ...


OMG. You clearly aren’t an accountant or MBA. How many times do I need to explain to folks that revenue is irrelevant?  The question is how profitable they are, which also means including expenses.  And we all know USSF spends a lot more on the men to earn that lower revenue. The women bring in higher revenue and have lower expenses. They deserve to be paid more.


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## EOTL (May 7, 2020)

whatithink said:


> I have to admit to being somewhat mystified by the back & forth here. The facts are pretty simple and the judge ruled on the facts, based on the contracts the players negotiated and the versions of the contracts offered during the negotiations. The judge also allowed the WNT to proceed with the pieces which appeared discriminatory, but outside the contractual relationships.
> 
> The WNT were offered the same contract as the MNT and rejected it. So there's no gender discrimination. They generated more revenue in the period in question and got paid more in the period in question. Both were marginal but probably equate. They could have had a bigger upside with a different agreement ... but they didn't have a different agreement!
> 
> If the WNT now feel they have greater worth and deserve a better deal, then have at it and negotiate that. You can't go back, though, and say I want everything I had plus I want all the upside from a different contract that I rejected.


We must accept it because that’s how a judge ruled? Is that how you feel about the Dred Scott case? People should have just accepted that black people aren’t American citizens because that’s what some judges decided (Dred Scott)? Or it was constitutional to make black kids go to black only schools (Please v Ferguson)?

But let’s put “the law” aside for a minute. Do you agree that the WNT should make more than the MNT if the WNT consistently brings in more revenue and has fewer expenses?  Do you agree that - if it were possible to apportion out the $10 million Nike contract for the WNT and MNT and the WNT was responsible for $7 million of it - that the WNT should get credit for that? Should the WNT get credit for the higher tv ratings and additional revenue generated by that? No hiding behind a CBA to rationalize why they don’t. I’d like to know what you think they should receive, not more excuses about why they don’t.


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## MWN (May 7, 2020)

EOTL said:


> We must accept it because that’s how a judge ruled? Is that how you feel about the Dred Scott case? People should have just accepted that black people aren’t American citizens because that’s what some judges decided (Dred Scott)? Or it was constitutional to make black kids go to black only schools (Please v Ferguson)?
> 
> But let’s put “the law” aside for a minute. Do you agree that the WNT should make more than the MNT if the WNT consistently brings in more revenue and has fewer expenses?  Do you agree that - if it were possible to apportion out the $10 million Nike contract for the WNT and MNT and the WNT was responsible for $7 million of it - that the WNT should get credit for that? Should the WNT get credit for the higher tv ratings and additional revenue generated by that? *No hiding behind a CBA to rationalize why they don’t. *I’d like to know what you think they should receive, not more excuses about why they don’t.


???? 

Under the 2017 CBA they negotiated additional bonuses for exceeding Sum gross revenue targets and for increased viewership, so they are getting many of these things you identified above.



MWN said:


> Ultimately, the parties USSF and WNT agreed and compromised and entered into a new CBA, which provides for bonuses for Olympic qualifying, bonuses for medaling, NWSL bonuses, guaranteed minimum compensation, one-time signing bonus of $230,000, ticket revenue share of $1.50 per ticket, $5k bonus for She Believes and Four Nations Tournament win, severance, injury protection, health, dental and vision, pregnancy pay, guaranteed rest time, child care assistance, *partnership bonus for exceeding Sum gross revenue targets, bonus for increased viewership, annual payment in exchange for USSF's commercial use of player likeness;* and, a clause that the USSF will schedule a minimum number of WNT games. (_source, Page 13 and 14 of Summary Judgment Opinion_)


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## texanincali (May 7, 2020)

EOTL said:


> But let’s put “the law” aside for a minute.


And...this is where everything falls apart.



EOTL said:


> Do you agree that - if it were possible to apportion out the $10 million Nike contract for the WNT and MNT and the WNT was responsible for $7 million of it - that the WNT should get credit for that? Should the WNT get credit for the higher tv ratings and additional revenue generated by that?


Absolutely not.  That is not how those contracts work.  The contracts were negotiated before any of that information was available.  Since the 2015-2019 info is now available, the women can use that information to go after more in their next CBA.  You do not get to go back and change the terms of a contract in any business, soccer included.

You're moving a lot of goal posts here.


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## whatithink (May 7, 2020)

EOTL said:


> We must accept it because that’s how a judge ruled? Is that how you feel about the Dred Scott case? People should have just accepted that black people aren’t American citizens because that’s what some judges decided (Dred Scott)? Or it was constitutional to make black kids go to black only schools (Please v Ferguson)?
> 
> But let’s put “the law” aside for a minute. Do you agree that the WNT should make more than the MNT if the WNT consistently brings in more revenue and has fewer expenses?  Do you agree that - if it were possible to apportion out the $10 million Nike contract for the WNT and MNT and the WNT was responsible for $7 million of it - that the WNT should get credit for that? Should the WNT get credit for the higher tv ratings and additional revenue generated by that? No hiding behind a CBA to rationalize why they don’t. I’d like to know what you think they should receive, not more excuses about why they don’t.


Yes, they should get paid more and should go to USSF and negotiate accordingly. I'd suggest they hire someone competent to do that who can clearly align the revenues they generate, the success they bring and therefore their worth and how that should be compensated. 

wrt the court case, they have no case under the CBA, that's clear. They signed a contract, so you can't put the law aside and now say what about this, that and the other. None of that is an excuse, its just a fact.

They may have a case for the rest, and so that's been allowed to proceed.


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## EOTL (May 7, 2020)

texanincali said:


> And...this is where everything falls apart.
> 
> 
> Absolutely not.  That is not how those contracts work.  The contracts were negotiated before any of that information was available.  Since the 2015-2019 info is now available, the women can use that information to go after more in their next CBA.  You do not get to go back and change the terms of a contract in any business, soccer included.
> ...


That’s what I thought, hiding behind a contract to continue rationalizing the continuing underpayment of women. No contract may waive someone’s civil rights, whether a CBA or otherwise. You can’t even muster the “courage” to admit that women should be paid more even when they earn more. Sheesh.

How about a labor union negotiating a contract that pays blacks at a lower rate?  They agreed to it, are they stuck with the lower pay rate until the next collective bargaining cycle?  Or is it just women who we can force to endure discriminatory CBAs?


----------



## texanincali (May 7, 2020)

EOTL said:


> You can’t even muster the “courage” to admit that women should be paid more even when they earn more.


You've gone off your rocker.  Of course I/we can admit that.  USSF admitted that.  The financial statements admit that.  The judge admitted that.  The only ones that can seem to admit they were paid more when they earned more are the women's team.  They were paid more during the period where they earned more.  Are you disputing this?  What am I missing here?



EOTL said:


> How about a labor union negotiating a contract that pays blacks at a lower rate? They agreed to it, are they stuck with the lower pay rate until the next collective bargaining cycle? Or is it just women who we can force to endure discriminatory CBAs?


You can turn this into whatever "ism" you want, because that is really all you can fall back on.  Are you being purposefully obtuse?  What part of lower % in exchange for guaranteed pay are you not understanding?  There is no way you can possibly not understand how simple this is.  No one forced them to endure anything.  The CBA was ratified and executed by them and their representatives.


----------



## EOTL (May 7, 2020)

texanincali said:


> You've gone off your rocker.  Of course I/we can admit that.  USSF admitted that.  The financial statements admit that.  The judge admitted that.  The only ones that can seem to admit they were paid more when they earned more are the women's team.  They were paid more during the period where they earned more.  Are you disputing this?  What am I missing here?
> 
> 
> You can turn this into whatever "ism" you want, because that is really all you can fall back on.  Are you being purposefully obtuse?  What part of lower % in exchange for guaranteed pay are you not understanding?  There is no way you can possibly not understand how simple this is.  No one forced them to endure anything.  The CBA was ratified and executed by them and their representatives.


So it’s ok for an employer to negotiate lower rates for blacks also then. How awesome. If they strike, we can really get what we wanted, which it to get rid of the entire protected class.


----------



## texanincali (May 7, 2020)

EOTL said:


> So it’s ok for an employer to negotiate lower rates for blacks also then. How awesome. If they strike, we can really get what we wanted, which it to get rid of the entire protected class.


At this point, I am convinced you have no idea what you are even debating any longer.  When did African Americans become part of this debate.  Also, I find it extremely offensive that you are using the term "blacks."  I don't think this is an area you want to wade into.


----------



## texanincali (May 7, 2020)

@EOTL 

Let me lay out the options as I see them for the USWNT moving forward.  I am genuinely interested in which one you would think is best.  It's the only way I think I can wrap my head around your mental gymnastics. 

1.  Negotiate a bigger % of revenue than current, negotiate travel as they want, hotels as they want, per diem as they want.  Negotiate bigger bonuses for major tournaments, appearance bonuses, win bonuses.  Basically the same exact structure the men have, but with higher percentages or bonuses.  With this, they would have to give up their guaranteed salaries, benefits, maternity leave, etc.  If they aren't in a matchday squad they don't get paid.
2.  Keep guaranteed compensation and additional benefits, which essentially keeps the domestic pro league afloat in exchange for a lower % of profit sharing. 
3.  Agree with USSF that they will except the exact same pay structure as the men, true equality.  With this comes the mandate that USSF separate the men and women into two entities.  Each get the same % from TV, gate, sponsor and merchandise sales.  A committee with a Fed member, USMNT member and USWNT member would be part of the negotiating team for each entity.

Which one is closest to your line of thinking?  I don't see many other viable options.


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## EOTL (May 7, 2020)

texanincali said:


> @EOTL
> 
> Let me lay out the options as I see them for the USWNT moving forward.  I am genuinely interested in which one you would think is best.  It's the only way I think I can wrap my head around your mental gymnastics.
> 
> ...


This is how it should be done. The MNT gets nothing. Zero. NBA and MLB players don’t get paid when they represent our country, because they don’t need the money. The little s**ts who can’t even beat T&T don’t deserve it because they don’t need it.

Furthermore, they also don’t deserve to get paid because, with the possible exception of Pulisic, every single one of them is completely replaceable by someone who would do it for free without any meaningful change in outcomes. There are 150 million men in the US, and any one of them can score zero goals just like Jozy Altidore. I concede that you would be hard-pressed to find someone in that 150 million who will turn over the ball at a higher rate than Michael Bradley or play less defense. You could field a team for free that will still lose to T&T. You could even make more money with the free team because they’re going to sell out the Rose Bowl when they play Mexico, instead of the current bunch doing that in a 24,000 seat stadium in Ohio because they’re too chicken to play in a real stadium.

And then pay the women at least twice what they currently make because, unlike the men, each of them individually is incredibly valuable. If you replace the best 18 with the next best, they don’t even make the WC finals and USSF’s advertising revenues completely collapse.


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## texanincali (May 7, 2020)

EOTL said:


> This is how it should be done. The MNT gets nothing. Zero. NBA and MLB players don’t get paid when they represent our country, because they don’t need the money. The little s**ts who can’t even beat T&T don’t deserve it because they don’t need it.
> 
> Furthermore, they also don’t deserve to get paid because, with the possible exception of Pulisic, every single one of them is completely replaceable by someone who would do it for free without any meaningful change in outcomes. There are 150 million men in the US, and any one of them can score zero goals just like Jozy Altidore. I concede that you would be hard-pressed to find someone in that 150 million who will turn over the ball at a higher rate than Michael Bradley or play less defense. You could field a team for free that will still lose to T&T. You could even make more money with the free team because they’re going to sell out the Rose Bowl when they play Mexico, instead of the current bunch doing that in a 24,000 seat stadium in Ohio because they’re too chicken to play in a real stadium.
> 
> And then pay the women at least twice what they currently make because, unlike the men, each of them individually is incredibly valuable. If you replace the best 18 with the next best, they don’t even make the WC finals and USSF’s advertising revenues completely collapse.


Thanks for your honest response.  I can now clearly see where you are coming from.  I think the misandry, disingenuousness and whataboutism of your posts come through load and clear.  I’ve enjoyed the debate.


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## EOTL (May 7, 2020)

texanincali said:


> Thanks for your honest response.  I can now clearly see where you are coming from.  I think the misandry, disingenuousness and whataboutism of your posts come through load and clear.  I’ve enjoyed the debate.


If you want an honest answer, read my prior posts. They are exhaustive if not exhausting.


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## EOTL (May 7, 2020)

EOTL said:


> If you want an honest answer, read my prior posts. They are exhaustive if not exhausting.


And also answer my question about whether it’s ok to pay blacks less in a CBA...


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## texanincali (May 7, 2020)

EOTL said:


> And also answer my question about whether it’s ok to pay blacks less in a CBA...


This is more exhausting than fighting with my 3 year old about eating her peas.  In what world do African Americans, or blacks as you call them, collectively bargain as a race?  Please give me one example of this.  You need to come back to planet earth.


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## EOTL (May 7, 2020)

texanincali said:


> You've gone off your rocker.  Of course I/we can admit that.  USSF admitted that.  The financial statements admit that.  The judge admitted that.  The only ones that can seem to admit they were paid more when they earned more are the women's team.  They were paid more during the period where they earned more.  Are you disputing this?  What am I missing here?
> 
> 
> You can turn this into whatever "ism" you want, because that is really all you can fall back on.  Are you being purposefully obtuse?  What part of lower % in exchange for guaranteed pay are you not understanding?  There is no way you can possibly not understand how simple this is.  No one forced them to endure anything.  The CBA was ratified and executed by them and their representatives.


One more thing.  Labeling systemic discrimination as an “-ism” is offensive. It’s a pejorative term used to minimize the reality of discrimination and put down people who support civil rights. Any time someone discusses discrimination and says “whatever” tells me everything I need to know about your character.


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## EOTL (May 7, 2020)

texanincali said:


> This is more exhausting than fighting with my 3 year old about eating her peas.  In what world do African Americans, or blacks as you call them, collectively bargain as a race?  Please give me one example of this.  You need to come back to planet earth.


No, it is US companies that made them do this for many years. They were able to do this because their option was either take the lesser rate or be unemployed.  Sound familiar?

Georgia Railroad is one that comes immediately to mind before they got slammed down by the NLRB. Answer the question.


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## EOTL (May 7, 2020)

EOTL said:


> No, it is US companies that made them do this for many years. They were able to do this because their option was either take the lesser rate or be unemployed.  Sound familiar?
> 
> Georgia Railroad is one that comes immediately to mind before they got slammed down by the NLRB. Answer the question.


And BTW, welcome to Cali cowboy.


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## texanincali (May 7, 2020)

EOTL said:


> No, it is US companies that made them do this for many years. They were able to do this because their option was either take the lesser rate or be unemployed.  Sound familiar?
> 
> Georgia Railroad is one that comes immediately to mind before they got slammed down by the NLRB. Answer the question.


Sorry for the delayed response.  I had to have a quick debate with my other daughter who’s 9 to try and crack your code.

There is no question to answer. It’s purely and completely a hypothetical. I have no desire to debate Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny.

Seriously, that little mouse in your head has to be tired of spinning that wheel.  Let’s give her a rest and leave this alone.  I wish the best for you and the USWNT and look forward to the upcoming protests that are sure to come.


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## EOTL (May 7, 2020)

texanincali said:


> Sorry for the delayed response.  I had to have a quick debate with my other daughter who’s 9 to try and crack your code.
> 
> There is no question to answer. It’s purely and completely a hypothetical. I have no desire to debate Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny.
> 
> Seriously, that little mouse in your head has to be tired of spinning that wheel.  Let’s give her a rest and leave this alone.  I wish the best for you and the USWNT and look forward to the upcoming protests that are sure to come.


it’s not a hypothetical with the WNT, and it wasn’t if you were black and looking for a job at Georgia Railroad. You asked for an example and I gave
you one. Answer the question.


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## EOTL (May 7, 2020)

EOTL said:


> it’s not a hypothetical with the WNT, and it wasn’t if you were black and looking for a job at Georgia Railroad. You asked for an example and I gave
> you one. Answer the question.


Clearly you’re having trouble with the Hobson’s choice, but that’s the point. You’re either ok with racism or you need to concede that it’s not ok to make the WNT comply with a discriminatory CBA. It’s no wonder why you keep deflecting.


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## Keepermom2 (May 8, 2020)

texanincali said:


> Sorry for the delayed response.  I had to have a quick debate with my other daughter who’s 9 to try and crack your code.
> 
> There is no question to answer. It’s purely and completely a hypothetical. I have no desire to debate Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny.
> 
> Seriously, that little mouse in your head has to be tired of spinning that wheel.  Let’s give her a rest and leave this alone.  I wish the best for you and the USWNT and look forward to the upcoming protests that are sure to come.


The point is...you can't strictly look at this from the perspective of they signed a contract so they agreed to the pay they received.  That isn't the way civil rights works.


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## MWN (May 8, 2020)

@EOTL, @Keepermom2, @es_surf and @texanincali,

I don't think many would argue that the landscape facing women in sports is one of inequality.  Inequality of revenue, pay, opportunity, etc.

We seem to be going around and round with the various arguments either accepting or not accepting an important fact, which is:

*"Did the Federation and WNT attempt to address the inequality issue in 2011/12?  If so, was it legally sufficient?"*

I look at the facts and conclude that in 2011/12 the Federation and WNT worked together and attempted to craft an agreement that would balance the inequities of the women's game.  Both parties recognized the inequities and concluded that if the WNT adopted the same pay structure as the MNT the women would have compensation swings that would be difficult to manage.  This reality was due to the fact that the MNT players were solely under a performance for pay structure AND were being paid a living wage through their play in professional leagues.  The women did not have a league (at the time) and wanted a different deal.

They received a different deal, the principal difference being they became salaried employees and in exchange for a $100k salary and benefits, agreed to take a lower amount of "bonus" compensation and received additional bonuses to if they played in the new NWSL.

Under the facts and circumstances facing both the USSF and WNT, I conclude the concessions and resulting CBA was legally sufficient to address the inequities facing the women's national team members, thus, the CBA did not violate the civil rights of the players.  Moreover, this fact is borne out by the indisputable fact that during the period the WNT players brought their lawsuit, the WNT players were actually paid more than the MNT because the MNT failed to qualify for various bonuses due in large part to the MNT's failure to qualify for the World Cup.

There was not a prima facia "equal pay act" violation because the men were actually paid less.  Moreover, I believe that even if the men were paid more, the Federation has an relatively air-tight affirmative defense under the "quality and quantity" exceptions to the Act.

Reasonable minds can look at the negotiations differently, but the fact the USWNT players were given a salary and NWSL bonus and health care, severance, child care, and many other benefits that the MNT did not receive makes me believe the Federation and WNT negotiated in good faith and there was no malice or intent to pay the women's less by taking advantage of an unequal bargaining position, rather, it was to pay them differently in an attempt to cure the inequities of the women's game versus the men's game.

*"Did the Federation and WNT attempt to address the increasing "value" the WNT brought to the Federation in 2016/17?  If so, was it legally sufficient?"*

I conclude they did because the women successfully negotiated for the similar benefits they received in the 2011/12 CBA and negotiated for additional bonuses relating to ticket sales, viewership and exceeding revenue targets.

In short, the current CBA includes language that rewards the WNT for bringing in additional "quantities."  The civil rights of the WNT was not violated by the Federation, and the parties have worked together in good faith to address the inequities through the guaranteed compensation and additional "value" bonuses.


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## EOTL (May 8, 2020)

Keepermom2 said:


> The point is...you can't strictly look at this from the perspective of they signed a contract so they agreed to the pay they received.  That isn't the way civil rights works.





MWN said:


> @EOTL, @Keepermom2, @es_surf and @texanincali,
> 
> I don't think many would argue that the landscape facing women in sports is one of inequality.  Inequality of revenue, pay, opportunity, etc.
> 
> ...


As I said earlier, the Equal Pay Act claim was always a weak one for the reasons you state. The elements of that claim do not fit well for their situation. That is not an argument I am making.  The Title VII claim is the better one, although it doesn’t seem like the WNT lawyers understood that as early  as they should have. It makes sense that they thought the EPA claim would be the better one because they certainly believed (as it turns out wrongly) that the women made less per game and that this would be a really simple and straightforward slam dunk because that would only require the adding up payments and then dividing it by games. You can see the mistake the WNT lawyers made very clearly when you look at their experts and the focus of their reports. But the Title VII claim requires a lot more detailed expert analysis and requires dragging in advertisers, which is often hard to do and risks killing the golden goose. They failed to do that work, and have at least temporarily paid the price for it. 

Your conclusion that you believe the CBA did not violate their civil rights is certainly your opinion and you are entitled to that. But that does not mean the WNT are stuck with it because your opinion is that it’s fair enough. It seems that you are now saying you believe the CBA is fair, which is a point that merits legitimate discussion. But that is different than the argument you and others were making earlier, which is that it doesn’t matter whether the CBA discriminates against the WNT, they’re stuck with it because that’s what they agreed to. That latter argument is unequivocally b.s. and wrong. It’s just an excuse to avoid having to address the real issue, which is whether the terms are discriminatory and whether USSF was able to use its superior bargaining position over the WNT compared to the MNT to negotiate those deals by virtue of the fact that they are women. Because things start to go downhill fast for ya’ll when you do that. Even the court cited admissions by USSF in that regard that are very damaging.

Because reasonable minds may differ as you concede, that pretty much sums up why this case should go to a jury. Regardless, whether the WNT can fit their square facts into the round hole of an Equal Pay Act claim ignores the fundamental moral issue, which is whether the women should receive much more money than they currently do relative to the men, as it is undisputed that that they are responsible for far more of USSF’s profit.


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## EOTL (May 8, 2020)

My favorite part of this discussion is how offended people get over the concept that not only do the WNT deserve “equal pay”, but they deserve a lot more pay. The concept that the WNT players are so much more valuable to USSF than the MNT players is something they assume cannot possibly be true.

The WNT lawyers completely screwed up by asserting the EPA claim at all, or at least leading off with it. By doing so, they framed the entire argument to their own detriment - which is that they are entitled to be paid the same amount - because an EPA claim focuses on whether they are paid the same amount, not whether they are paid for their actual value.  Instead, the argument should have been that they should be paid based on the proportionate value they provide to USSF.  the lawyers should have dismissed the EPA claim the minute it became clear that they were paid a little more overall. 

Paying someone “equally” for either discrimination or moral purposes does not mean paying the same amount. It means paying people appropriately based on the value they provide. If, for example, a company pays a male and female sales person the same amount, but only because the man’s commission rate is higher, there is no EPA claim, but it is still problematic under Title VII. That’s the argument the WNT lawyers should have hammered home.


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## Keepermom2 (May 8, 2020)

EOTL said:


> As I said earlier, the Equal Pay Act claim was always a weak one for the reasons you state. The elements of that claim do not fit well for their situation. That is not an argument I am making.  The Title VII claim is the better one, although it doesn’t seem like the WNT lawyers understood that as early  as they should have. It makes sense that they thought the EPA claim would be the better one because they certainly believed (as it turns out wrongly) that the women made less per game and that this would be a really simple and straightforward slam dunk because that would only require the adding up payments and then dividing it by games. You can see the mistake the WNT lawyers made very clearly when you look at their experts and the focus of their reports. But the Title VII claim requires a lot more detailed expert analysis and requires dragging in advertisers, which is often hard to do and risks killing the golden goose. They failed to do that work, and have at least temporarily paid the price for it.
> 
> Your conclusion that you believe the CBA did not violate their civil rights is certainly your opinion and you are entitled to that. But that does not mean the WNT are stuck with it because your opinion is that it’s fair enough. It seems that you are now saying you believe the CBA is fair, which is a point that merits legitimate discussion. But that is different than the argument you and others were making earlier, which is that it doesn’t matter whether the CBA discriminates against the WNT, they’re stuck with it because that’s what they agreed to. That latter argument is unequivocally b.s. and wrong. It’s just an excuse to avoid having to address the real issue, which is whether the terms are discriminatory and whether USSF was able to use its superior bargaining position over the WNT compared to the MNT to negotiate those deals by virtue of the fact that they are women. Because things start to go downhill fast for ya’ll when you do that. Even the court cited admissions by USSF in that regard that are very damaging.
> 
> Because reasonable minds may differ as you concede, that pretty much sums up why this case should go to a jury. Regardless, whether the WNT can fit their square facts into the round hole of an Equal Pay Act claim ignores the fundamental moral issue, which is whether the women should receive much more money than they currently do relative to the men, as it is undisputed that that they are responsible for far more of USSF’s profit.


Like wasn't enough...."Bravo" is more appropriate.


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## MWN (May 8, 2020)

EOTL said:


> As I said earlier, the Equal Pay Act claim was always a weak one for the reasons you state. The elements of that claim do not fit well for their situation. That is not an argument I am making.  The Title VII claim is the better one, although it doesn’t seem like the WNT lawyers understood that as early  as they should have. It makes sense that they thought the EPA claim would be the better one because they certainly believed (as it turns out wrongly) that the women made less per game and that this would be a really simple and straightforward slam dunk because that would only require the adding up payments and then dividing it by games. You can see the mistake the WNT lawyers made very clearly when you look at their experts and the focus of their reports. But the Title VII claim requires a lot more detailed expert analysis and requires dragging in advertisers, which is often hard to do and risks killing the golden goose. They failed to do that work, and have at least temporarily paid the price for it.
> 
> Your conclusion that you believe the CBA did not violate their civil rights is certainly your opinion and you are entitled to that. But that does not mean the WNT are stuck with it because your opinion is that it’s fair enough. It seems that you are now saying you believe the CBA is fair, which is a point that merits legitimate discussion. But that is different than the argument you and others were making earlier, which is that it doesn’t matter whether the CBA discriminates against the WNT, they’re stuck with it because that’s what they agreed to. That latter argument is unequivocally b.s. and wrong. It’s just an excuse to avoid having to address the real issue, which is whether the terms are discriminatory and whether USSF was able to use its superior bargaining position over the WNT compared to the MNT to negotiate those deals by virtue of the fact that they are women. Because things start to go downhill fast for ya’ll when you do that. Even the court cited admissions by USSF in that regard that are very damaging.
> 
> Because reasonable minds may differ as you concede, that pretty much sums up why this case should go to a jury. Regardless, whether the WNT can fit their square facts into the round hole of an Equal Pay Act claim ignores the fundamental moral issue, which is whether the women should receive much more money than they currently do relative to the men, as it is undisputed that that they are responsible for far more of USSF’s profit.


I completely disagree with your analysis.

"Reasonable minds can look at the negotiations differently."  Reasonable minds could not look at the fact that the women are paid a salary, have a deal with less risk in favor of guaranteed compensation and were actually paid more (during the relevant period) any differently, that would be unreasonable.  These facts are undisputed and fatal to both the EPA and Title VII claims.

But let's say for the sake of argument that the WNT was actually paid less because they didn't make their bonus money OR the USMNT made their bonus money.  Let's pretend the WNT made a prima facia case under Title IV and the EPA.  They still lose their compensation claim, which is the meat of their suit.

There is no dispute that the MNT is compensated using an "incentive system." There is also no dispute that the MNT does not receive a salary and their compensation is based largely on participation in camps, games and wining tournaments.

Under both the EPA and Title VII the law requires the discriminatory conduct to be viewed through a historical lens ... what were the facts being relied upon to justify the disparate pay the years leading up to 2011/12.  It would be improper to impute today's facts or arguments to the 2012 CBA.  At the time that the 2011/12 CBA's was negotiated, the USMNT objectively brought in more revenue to the USSF.   The WNT had just come in 2nd in the 2011 WC, and FIFA was paying a total of $5.8M in prize money, with the winner receiving $1M.  The USWNT generated much less in prize money, as well as advertising and marketing dollars.

Here, the Federation had really good facts on their side.

Under TItle VII and the EPA we look at all compensation.  Starting at "base compensation" and then "non base compensation."

Base Compensation.  Women receive $100k salary and about $65k for NWSL, Men receive $0.  No Discrimination against women ... arguably discrimination against MNT.

Non-Base Compensation.  We are going to have to figure out a discounted value for the $165k of base compensation plus benefits paid to the women, which is a big problem for the WNT.  And then see if the discounted "bonus" structure is objectively fair using 2011/12 facts.

While figuring out the discount value of the guaranteed commission, we nonetheless have to recognize that an employer can justify a compensation disparity by proving that the higher paid employee generates more revenue for the employer than the lower paid employee.   _See, e.g., Byrd v. Ronayne_, 61 F.3d 1026, 1034 (1st Cir. 1995) (higher compensation for male attorney justified because he generated substantially greater revenue for law firm).  But, we need to do this with facts from the time and not today's facts.

Title VII adopts the EPA's four affirmative defenses, which provide a sex-based compensation difference in substantially equal jobs is justified if it is based on:

a _seniority system_;
a _merit system_;
a _system which measures earnings by quantity or quality of production ("incentive system")_; or
_any other factor other than sex_.
The fatal flaw in the position/argument of the USWNT is that the MNT's incentive system was better than their incentive system because the Federation measured the bonus to the MNT based on quantity/quality of production (more prize money = more bonus).  If the USWNT's union had not demanded guaranteed compensation (i.e. no salary and NWSL bonus) they would have and argument, but their union negotiated guaranteed pay killing their bonus discrimination argument.

The other kicker is that under Title VII, they are suing only 1 of the 2 parties that allegedly wronged them.  An employer's assertion that a compensation differential is attributable to a collective bargaining agreement does not constitute a defense under the EPA. If the union contributed to the creation of a compensation differential, the union should be added as a respondent.  The EPA specifically provides that no labor organization "shall cause or attempt to cause" a covered employer to violate the statute. _29 U.S.C. 206(d)(2)_.   By asking for a salary and and NWSL bonus, the Players Association opened the door to discounted bonuses and contributed to the potential compensation differential.  Looks like the USWNT Players Association is going to get dragged into a lawsuit by its members.

Fast forward to the 2016/17 CBA, the Player's Association received some additional concessions from the Federation, but the facts in 2016/17 must be used, not the 2019 circumstances. 

The payment of guaranteed compensation is simply fatal to their claims under Title VII and the EPA, especially because the bonuses are tied to "quantity and quality" which are affirmative defenses under both the EPA and Title VII.

EDIT: I don't believe I ever stated this: _"But that is different than the argument you and others were making earlier, which is that it doesn’t matter whether the CBA discriminates against the WNT, they’re stuck with it because that’s what they agreed to._"  My position has always been the guaranteed compensation negotiated in the 2012 and 2017 CBA's created a different deal that was non discriminatory on its face (at least to the WNT) and is fatal to the claims because the USWNT traded risk for certainty.


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## Keepermom2 (May 8, 2020)

MWN said:


> I completely disagree with your analysis.
> 
> "Reasonable minds can look at the negotiations differently."  Reasonable minds could not look at the fact that the women are paid a salary, have a deal with less risk in favor of guaranteed compensation and were actually paid more (during the relevant period) any differently, that would be unreasonable.  These facts are undisputed and fatal to both the EPA and Title VII claims.
> 
> ...


I obviously do not have a legal background but the fact that


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## Keepermom2 (May 9, 2020)

Keepermom2 said:


> I obviously do not have a legal background but the fact that


I do not know why I can't delete mistakes anymore.


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## espola (May 9, 2020)

Keepermom2 said:


> I do not know why I can't delete mistakes anymore.


It's one fo the recent improvements to the website.  To get more control (maybe) pony up for a premier rmembership



			https://www.socalsoccer.com/account/upgrades


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## Keepermom2 (May 9, 2020)

From reading the information below, and the judge's ruling, I am perplexed and feel like there is some missing information.  I don't understand why Rapinoe and the team's attorney believe they "asked to be under the men's contract, and it was repeatedly refused to us".  

*1. Forbes May 4, 2020: *

However, that’s not the way the women see it. On CBS This Morning, team co-captain Megan Rapinoe contradicted the judge’s assertion that the women turned down the men’s deal, *“We asked to be under the men’s contract, and it was repeatedly refused to us, not only in the structure but in the total compensation. If we were under that contract, we would have earned at least three times higher.”   

Women Generated More Revenue*-Although the lack of revenue generation is often an argument for why female athletes make far less than their male counterparts, that argument doesn’t seem to apply in this case. The wildly successful female soccer players brought in more money than their male counterparts, as pointed out in the lawsuit, “during the period relevant to this case, the WNT earned more in profit and/or revenue than the MNT.” The judge also did not seem to give any credibility to U.S. Soccer’s claim that men deserve more money because men have more ability, strength and speed.

*2. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/uswnt-appeal-us-womens-national-soccer-team-plans-to-appeal-judges-dismissal-of-equal-pay-claim/ *
I
"Levinson took issue with that reasoning, writing, "The argument that women gave up a right to equal pay by accepting the best collective bargaining agreement possible...in response to the Federation's refusal to put equal pay on the table is not a legitimate reason for continuing to discriminate against them."

*3. From Law-llc.com 2019:*

However, even if the Equal Pay Act claim fails, the USWNT members can rely on *Title VII*, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e, which does not have an “equal work” requirement. Instead, the employee must establish that she, as a woman, is not being paid equally for _similar_ work. As a trade-off for this relaxed standard, though, the employee must show that the employer _intended _to discriminate. *The comment by the USSF official stating that, “market realities are such that the women do not deserve to be paid equally to the men,” could be an example of such intent.

Just some additional facts FYI from Yahoo Finance July 9, 2019...*
In addition, Nike CEO Mark Parker recently disclosed on an earnings call that the U.S. Women's home jersey is “now the No. 1 soccer jersey, men's or women's, ever sold on Nike.com in one season.”

"U.S. Soccer sponsorship revenue grew 25% between 2015 and 2016 after the USWNT won the 2015 Women’s World Cup, but U.S. Soccer sells sponsorships and broadcasting deals in a bundle, so we can’t separate how much of that revenue comes from the men vs the women."


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## Ellejustus (May 10, 2020)

What would we do without women in soccer?  I'm sad how disrespected they have been by the men in soccer and how young girls were over used in club soccer.  Selfish and greedy.  Listen, my dd is playing soccer right now because she was inspired by the WNT players. Most families I know are spending $15,000+ a year ((according to Hope Solo and a few others I know on here)).  I would also say were all here on the forum 100% because of how awesome girls soccer is.  Why? Because they win!!


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## EOTL (May 11, 2020)

MWN said:


> I completely disagree with your analysis.
> 
> "Reasonable minds can look at the negotiations differently."  Reasonable minds could not look at the fact that the women are paid a salary, have a deal with less risk in favor of guaranteed compensation and were actually paid more (during the relevant period) any differently, that would be unreasonable.  These facts are undisputed and fatal to both the EPA and Title VII claims.
> 
> ...


OK that is just too long even for me. A couple points.

1. If you need to do a historical analysis dating back to a 2010/11 CBA to rationalize why you believe they are being treated equally in 2020, well, that pretty much speaks for itself.

2. When you say that “Under Title VII...we look at compensation”, that is also flat out wrong to the extent you suggest that is the only thing you look at. Even the court recognized the ridiculousness of that argument. Specifically, it allowed the discrimination claim to proceed on non-compensation issues, including the MNT flying charter and getting grass fields. Notably, these things were just as discriminatory in 2010/11 - looking through the “historical lens” that you find so compelling - as they are now. Stated differently, if you are going to look “through a historical lens”, you can’t selectively choose the things you like and ignore the pervasive discrimination that occurred historically. You need to address how the WNT was forced to endure awful conditions in 2010/11. You need to address how the USSF sustained a system that did not invest in marketing (or anything) for the WNT like they did MNT, thereby continuing a pattern in which the WNT was not provided equal opportunity to earn revenue, yet they did it anyway though their hard work over many years and despite the systematic discrimination against the WNT over time.

3. Yes, the women traded risk for certainty. But they had to do so because they have always been discriminated against, and still are, based on the leverage USSF has been able to exert in CBA negotiating based on their gender. Making the best out of being mistreated and discriminated against since the inception of the WNT kinda leaves you with no choice. I do have a question for you here. How could the issue about charter flights and playing on safer grass be discriminatory since, under your theory, they could have just bargained for that in their 2010/11 and subsequent CBAs?

Since the first three main arguments you made are complete rubbish, I decided to stop wasting my time with the others.


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## MWN (May 12, 2020)

Keepermom2 said:


> From reading the information below, and the judge's ruling, I am perplexed and feel like there is some missing information.  I don't understand why Rapinoe and the team's attorney believe they "asked to be under the men's contract, and it was repeatedly refused to us".
> 
> *1. Forbes May 4, 2020: *
> 
> ...


Its a PR ploy.  Their position is and has always been that they want "guaranteed compensation" (roughly 100k) and "NWSL" compensation (roughly 65k) and AND the same bonus structure as the men.  So when you here the USWNT team and their lawyers say "We wanted the same deal." They are simply referring to the bonus plan the men get, but refuse to lose the guaranteed compensation element of their deal. 

What you will never hear from Rapinoe and the plaintiffs is "We asked to be under the same deal as the MNT, including the no guaranteed compensation," because that would be false.  The other problem the WNT has is portions of the Men's bonus structure is tied to the Prize money, so what the women are really saying is we wanted the "Guaranteed compensation and Bonus that the Men would receive under the Men's World Cup prize structure, even though the prize money is much less in the Women's World Cup structure pursuant to the FIFA payouts."


MEN (Per Collective Bargain)WOMEN (Per Collective Bargain)SALARY (National Team Contract) 17 Players (16 in 2021)$0.00 (No US Soccer Salary)*$100,000*MLS/NWSL Bonus by US Soccer$0.00 (No US Soccer Bonus)*$67,500* (Tier 1)
*$62,500* (Tier 2)Call Ups  - Non Contract Players$3,500 - $4,000 per call-up (8+ Camps)$3,500 - $4,000 per call-up (8+ Camps)World Cup Roster Bonus*$68,750.00*$37,500Win Against Non Top Teams*$9,375 *(Outside Top 25)$5,250 (Outside Top 8)Loss Against Non Top Team*$5,000*$0.00Game Attendance $ per ticket$1.50 to Union*$1.50 + 7.5%* to Union above 17,000 txs.Game Sold OutNo Bonus*Bonus*Viewership BonusNo Bonus*Bonus *(if increase 10+%)

Just so we are clear, the foundation of the deal the women are under was negotiated back in 2011/12 and then renegotiate with the some additional elements.  So we have to look at the facts/circumstances at the time.


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## MWN (May 12, 2020)

EOTL said:


> OK that is just too long even for me. A couple points.
> 
> 1. If you need to do a historical analysis dating back to a 2010/11 CBA to rationalize why you believe they are being treated equally in 2020, well, that pretty much speaks for itself.
> 
> ...


@EOTL, I'm not going to allow you to misquote or misrepresent what I wrote without calling you on it.

Concerning point 1: Yes, when we are asking whether the deal was in violation of Title VII or the EPA we look at the circumstances at the time.  Here the deal was made in 2010/11 AND the "quality/quantity" affirmative defense the Federation has arose at that time.  The facts giving rise to the affirmative defense requires a historical analysis.  Whether the deal is objectively unfair now (2020) is not relevant for the lawsuit and outside the time period.  The women and federation can sit down at the negotiating table and renegotiate at any time or wait for the contract to end and restart.

Concerning point 2: My comment was limited to the "unequal compensation" claim, which is and has been the entirety of the discussion/debate.  The other claims are proceeding so not relevant to our discussion.  What I wrote was "Under TItle VII and the EPA we look at all compensation. Starting at "base compensation" and then "non base compensation." Attempting to misquote by omitting the "and the EPA" which qualified the statement to compensation analysis is misleading on your part.

Concerning point 3: The issues of charter flights and training and playing conditions remain the subject of the lawsuit and outside this discussion (see point 2).  Whether the Federation engaged in discriminatory conduct is subject to disputed testimony.  The USWNT alleged the MNT received charter flights and they didn't which was discriminatory.  The Federation presented evidence that the reason the MNT flew by charter was it was necessary to meet rest and timing requirements for high profile games (I recall the Mexico game was a 3 or 4 day period).  I don't know if the women were in similar circumstances, but that is for the lawyers and witnesses.  As far as playing on artificial turf in the World Cup (Canada), that was a FIFA call, not the Federation, but I recall the women refusing to play on artificial turf in Hawaii so its possible the WNT has some traction here.


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## EOTL (May 12, 2020)

MWN said:


> @EOTL, I'm not going to allow you to misquote or misrepresent what I wrote without calling you on it.
> 
> Concerning point 1: Yes, when we are asking whether the deal was in violation of Title VII or the EPA we look at the circumstances at the time.  Here the deal was made in 2010/11 AND the "quality/quantity" affirmative defense the Federation has arose at that time.  The facts giving rise to the affirmative defense requires a historical analysis.  Whether the deal is objectively unfair now (2020) is not relevant for the lawsuit and outside the time period.  The women and federation can sit down at the negotiating table and renegotiate at any time or wait for the contract to end and restart.
> 
> ...





MWN said:


> @EOTL, I'm not going to allow you to misquote or misrepresent what I wrote without calling you on it.
> 
> Concerning point 1: Yes, when we are asking whether the deal was in violation of Title VII or the EPA we look at the circumstances at the time.  Here the deal was made in 2010/11 AND the "quality/quantity" affirmative defense the Federation has arose at that time.  The facts giving rise to the affirmative defense requires a historical analysis.  Whether the deal is objectively unfair now (2020) is not relevant for the lawsuit and outside the time period.  The women and federation can sit down at the negotiating table and renegotiate at any time or wait for the contract to end and restart.
> 
> ...


Sorry buddy I’m pretty busy mocking the “let’s kill old people” folks in the other thread and don’t have time between that and work right now to address why everything you say is wrong. The good news is you raise nothing new here and I’ve already explained why it doesn’t make any sense.


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## GoldenGate (Feb 22, 2022)

FYI, in one of the largest settlements of a gender discrimination lawsuit in history, and easily the largest on a per person basis, US Soccer has agreed to pay $24 million retroactively and stop engaging in future wage discrimination.  For those who thought the wrongly decided district court decision was the final word, you were very wrong.  Now you have the actual final word, which is that US Soccer knew that the decision was getting reversed, it had a blatant history of mistreating its female players, and it needed to do whatever it took to not lose the massive amounts of revenue that the WNT generates from advertisers.  The only thing left to do now is to put the misogynistic 80 year old white man who issued that stupid decision out to pasture.


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