US Soccer: "Our Proposal for Equal Pay for Women & Men"
- Thread starter MWN
- Start date
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.
MSK357
GOLD
So only allow women to play goalie for a half? lol
texanincali
SILVER ELITE
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.
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.
Fair and balanced.
Please be respectful, we can argue and debate without name calling and profanity.
MSK357
GOLD
@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.
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.
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.
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.
@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.
texanincali
SILVER ELITE
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.
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.
@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.
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).
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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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.
texanincali
SILVER ELITE
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.
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.
