Nearly a year after its World Cup victory, the women’s national soccer team is back in the spotlight, this time with a different goal in mind. On March 31, 2015, five members of the U.S. team filed a wage-discrimination action against the U.S Soccer Federation.
Those filing the lawsuit, including team players Hope Solo, Carli Lloyd and Alex Morgan, argue that despite the women’s team generating $20 million more revenue than the U.S. men's, the women are paid about a quarter of what the men earn.
Here’s the breakdown of some of the inequality, courtesy of ESPN:
-The women earn $99,000 each if they win 20 friendlies.
-The men earn $263,320 each if they win 20 friendlies.
Even more:
-The men earn $100,000 each, even if they lose all 20 games.
And:
-The women get paid nothing for playing more than 20 games.
Meanwhile:
-The men get between $5,000 and $17,625 for each game past 20.
So you see the problem.
Kevin Baxter, reporter for the Los Angeles Times, writes extensively in his article about FIFA inequality about the struggles that not only FIFA players experience, but the struggles that female athletes of all different sports face.
“In sports, there’s never been a gender gap between men and women,” Baxter said. “It has always been more like a chasm.”
This is even more exemplified in the Women’s World Cup game last summer.
Let’s just flash back to July 5, 2015 for a second.
Carli Lloyd opened the match with two goals in the first five minutes of play, and completed her hat trick in the first half. Keep in mind also that the women were playing against Japan, the defending world champions. They scored five total goals against the defending champions, and even more, the first four goals scored by the United States team were the fastest four goals in women’s World Cup history. If that doesn’t exemplify America’s dominance in women’s athletics, I don’t know what does
But here we go with the wage-discrimination again:
The women’s national team was awarded a mere $2 million dollars for its victory compared to the $38 million dollars the German men’s team received for its victory the previous year, according to ESPN. Furthermore, the U.S. men’s team received $8 million in 2014 for simply making it to the round 16 of competition.
Oh, the chasm.
Flash forward to today:
The lawsuit filed by the women’s team is one step toward creating a more equal playing field for female athletes (pun intended? Maybe?).
Hope Solo, goalkeeper for the women’s national team and an all-around badass, comments on the importance this lawsuit has on the women’s athletics.
"In this day and age, it's about equality,” said Hope. “It's about equal rights. It's about equal pay. We're pushing for that. We believe now the time is right because we believe it's our responsibility for women's sports and, specifically for women's soccer, to do whatever it takes to push for equal pay and equal rights. And to be treated with respect."
Women’s athletic inequality runs much deeper than wage discrepancies. Female athletes must also face objectification, under and misrepresentation. To give you some context, thinkprogress.org found that only 2 percent of ESPN SportsCenter’s airtime was devoted to female sports. Even more alarming is the fact that this number has remained the same since 1999, although female participation has become increasingly popular.
A quote from FIFA Secretary General Jerome Valcke exemplifies the struggles women face in efforts to resolve these issues.
When referring back to the Women’s World Cup pay gap, Valcke had some, um, helpful, insightful advice to help women’s equality.
"We played [the] 30th World Cup in 2014, and we are playing the seventh Women's World Cup.... We are still another 23 World Cups before potentially women should receive the same amount as men."
Yeah that’s the attitude to have.
So that’s when it comes back to the women’s team. If there is going to be changes to women’s athletic equality, it's going to have to come from the women themselves. How should we view the lawsuit filed by the national team then? As a small step for filling the chasm? Maybe as a catalyst for women’s athletic reform? With the Rio Olympics approaching, female athletes are sure to soon be in the spotlight. We’ll have to wait and see what happens after the spotlight fades.
