Anonymous wrote:Good for them. Nothing is more demoralizing than explaining to my daughters and neices that their work is worth a fraction of a man's.

Send them to college in STEM and forget soccer.

I am a former woman soccer player that has a grad degree in a STEM field and I was never paid less than my male colleagues. I’m 49 and I’m a Senior position.

Competitive soccer helped me not be a shrinking violet/whiner in the workplace.

I hope their lawyers make the USSF pay through the nose. It looks like the USWNT brought in more revenue than USMNT in 2016, so there is no excuse to play them less than the USMNT players are paid. https://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/22/sports/soccer/usmnt-uswnt-soccer-equal-pay.html

"By filing this Complaint, each Plaintiff has demonstrated she has grown a set of balls and, accordingly, ought to be compensated equivalently to MNT players"

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Good for them. Nothing is more demoralizing than explaining to my daughters and neices that their work is worth a fraction of a man's.

Actually in many sports their worth absolutely is worth a fraction of men's. Not many people pay to go see women's soccer compared to men's soccer. Additionally people aren't willing to pay as much in ticket prices. From the article:
One of the biggest differences in compensation is the multimillion-dollar bonuses the teams receive for participating in the World Cup, but those bonuses — a pool of $400 million for 32 men’s teams versus $30 million for 24 women’s teams — are determined by FIFA, world soccer’s governing body, not U.S. Soccer.

It is about supply and demand. There just isn't the demand for most women's sports so us soccer isn't earning the same amount for women's soccer and feels it shouldn't spend as much as they do on men. Just like basketball. However, women should be getting better perks in gymnastics than men.

i can assure you I understand supply and demand and the impact that it has on relative wages. I can also assure you that discovery will reveal that wages and wage differentials will not track revenues generated by each team or player, any more than the price of your Venti Latte is driven by marginal cost.

I fully support them. One team falls apart when the women need part time jobs to support themselves after winning World Cup. Not all of them married a football star.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Good for them. Nothing is more demoralizing than explaining to my daughters and neices that their work is worth a fraction of a man's.

Actually in many sports their worth absolutely is worth a fraction of men's. Not many people pay to go see women's soccer compared to men's soccer. Additionally people aren't willing to pay as much in ticket prices. From the article:
One of the biggest differences in compensation is the multimillion-dollar bonuses the teams receive for participating in the World Cup, but those bonuses — a pool of $400 million for 32 men’s teams versus $30 million for 24 women’s teams — are determined by FIFA, world soccer’s governing body, not U.S. Soccer.

It is about supply and demand. There just isn't the demand for most women's sports so us soccer isn't earning the same amount for women's soccer and feels it shouldn't spend as much as they do on men. Just like basketball. However, women should be getting better perks in gymnastics than men.

U.S. soccer should pay players equitably for the same work.


if FIFA can find the money for wire fraud, racketeering and money laundering then they can find the money to pay women equitably for bonuses as well.

Big fan of the women’s team, try to watch all of their meaningful games, but I skipped the recent tournament on tv. Would have gone to see a game if any had been in DC (and have in the past). Very sympathetic to their pay demands as they are excellent and great to watch.

A couple things:

The women’s team does VERY well, and is obviously vastly more accomplished that the men’s team. Against far far weaker competition. It is like where our men’s basketball team used to beat the hell out of everyone in the Olympics. I mean, it was great, but just as our men are trying to catch up with the rest of the world in soccer, the rest of the world is trying to catch up with us in women’s soccer, thanks to our strong girls and college programs — and frankly a more open culture to strong women’s sports.

Yes, the ratings and attendance for the World Cup are strong for our women. But otherwise are pretty pathetic. Meanwhile the massive global FIFA cash haul from the huge men’s attendance and ratings helps underwrite lesser teams like USA men - who I should note do respectably in terms of attendance but not achievement

This is unlike tennis, where often the women were underpaid despite having as big or bigger ratings and attendance, which was nuts.

Seems like some sort of arrangement can be reached where we get our women’s team equal facilities and comparable pay — and meanwhile purported allies should get moving and start watching games and heading to the stadium, and not just get on the bandwagon every four years.

Interesting question is if TV, Ticket sales, and merchandise revenue should drive the pay equality for USNT players or if it should be an equal amount of pay based on the fact that this is a national team, not a professional club motivated by profit. There is only so much money to go around, so it seems reasonable to assume that if women are paid more, the men will be paid less. This may reduce the talent level on the men's side due to lowered compensation, but by how much … hard to say.

Probably a better approach is the following:

Three part compensation scheme:

-Base salary (equal for men and women)
-Variable comp based on rolling four year avg. annual revenue for respective team (this will likely continue to be higher for men)
-Variable comp (bonus) based on wins - getting out of group stage, winning major tourney, getting to semis, etc. (this will be higher for women, probably forever - that's a whole other forum topic)


As far as training facilities, they should be equal. Period. Silly not to be. In fact, I'd think they'd share these most of the time and could schedule around each other.

Anonymous wrote:Good for them. Nothing is more demoralizing than explaining to my daughters and neices that their work is worth a fraction of a man's.

Actually in many sports their worth absolutely is worth a fraction of men's. Not many people pay to go see women's soccer compared to men's soccer. Additionally people aren't willing to pay as much in ticket prices. From the article:
One of the biggest differences in compensation is the multimillion-dollar bonuses the teams receive for participating in the World Cup, but those bonuses — a pool of $400 million for 32 men’s teams versus $30 million for 24 women’s teams — are determined by FIFA, world soccer’s governing body, not U.S. Soccer.

It is about supply and demand. There just isn't the demand for most women's sports so us soccer isn't earning the same amount for women's soccer and feels it shouldn't spend as much as they do on men. Just like basketball. However, women should be getting better perks in gymnastics than men.

Good for them. Nothing is more demoralizing than explaining to my daughters and neices that their work is worth a fraction of a man's.

Anonymous wrote:They did the same thing in 2017

https://thinkprogress.org/womens-soccer-secures-new-deal-ffe06dc4b9e1/

Not exactly the same thing, the EEOC complaint didn't go anywhere for 3 years, and now this is a civil lawsuit stemming from the fact that their employer, did not cooperate with the EEOC.

Not sure what your point is about watching their last game against Brazil, I guess you're implying this is a publicity stunt? So it's ok that they get paid a fraction of the men's team even though they have a much better record on the world stage???

They did the same thing in 2017

https://thinkprogress.org/womens-soccer-secures-new-deal-ffe06dc4b9e1/

Not a guts move, they know this is a PR stunt and I am all for them being paid by their success but that money comes form revenue generated by ticket sales and TV revenue.

The fact is, women's soccer swells every 4 years here, men's as well, they should have a set schedule for the national teams no matter the sport, sex, and pay bonuses for results.

How many of you watched them play the other night? Care to share the score or who they were playing? The normal soccer thread people will know but those who are chiming in because it is a hot topic?

Happy International Women's Day!

Anonymous wrote:https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/08/sports/womens-soccer-team-lawsuit-gender-discrimination.html?smtyp=cur&smid=tw-nytimes

"All 28 members of the world champion United States women’s national team filed a gender discrimination lawsuit against the United States Soccer Federation on Friday, a sudden and significant escalation of a long-running fight over pay equity and working conditions that comes only months before the team will begin defense of its Women’s World Cup title."

Guess this was coming.

This takes a lot of guts at any time. But with the World Cup looming, major major guts. Performance should not matter to the merits of their claim. But we know that the public may be a little more skeptical about the lawsuit if they don't do really well. I am sure the players were all committed to victory before this, but after filing, you know they know they feel like they have to win it. Best of luck on both fronts from a dad who has only a son but saw his military mom fight a lot of gender discrimination for years.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/08/sports/womens-soccer-team-lawsuit-gender-discrimination.html?smtyp=cur&smid=tw-nytimes

"All 28 members of the world champion United States women’s national team filed a gender discrimination lawsuit against the United States Soccer Federation on Friday, a sudden and significant escalation of a long-running fight over pay equity and working conditions that comes only months before the team will begin defense of its Women’s World Cup title."

Guess this was coming.