Shoot for the stars (and money)
Shoot for the stars (and money)
Unfair pay in the world of sports.
I'm not much of a sports fan. But I've lived with sports fans for most of my life and know how the games are played. The Super Bowl is almost like a holiday in our house, and I fill out a March Madness bracket every year. I rarely sit through entire games, but I'll watch the exciting bits.
Like many people in the U.S., I've been captivated by Caitlin Clark, the basketball player for the University of Iowa Hawkeyes. On March 3, 2024, she became the all-time leading scorer in college basketball ever — male or female. The previous record had been set by a male player in 1970. I watched the moment that she scored the points to beat the record (a bit anti-climactic, since it was on a technical foul). And then I watched the NCAA championship game a few weeks later, when her team lost to South Carolina. SC was clearly the better team, and it was a well-deserved win.
Earlier this week, Caitlin Clark was drafted into the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA), the first overall pick. She was offered a four-year contract worth $338,056 with the Indiana Fever. She'll make $76,353 in year one. The number one NBA draft pick for men? Will earn $10.5 million in year one.
The uproar has been loud (and rightly so). Clark has been called a "once-in-a-generation" talent. But because she's a woman and not a man, she'll earn 0.72% of her male counterpart. Not even one percent.
My spouse assured me that she'll receive endorsements worth hundreds of millions of dollars. She will be fine, he said. I pushed back and said that's not the point. I can't imagine going to bed that night, after the draft had been finalized, knowing I'd only earn 0.72% of the salary of a person who's objectively less talented.
I went down a rabbit hole this week, trying to figure out how this is possible.
Pay that's proportionate to revenue
Starting in 2016, the women's soccer team in the U.S. filed a series of lawsuits against the United States Soccer Federation (USSF) alleging pay discrimination. This culminated in a 2022 complaint to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the government entity responsible for overseeing an employer's compliance with federal laws, including equal pay and treatment. The USSF agreed to pay a $24 million settlement, which includes back pay to female players. Today, the USSF website has a page on equal pay for men and women, saying, "U.S. Soccer is 100% committed to equal pay for our national team players."
Basketball is a different ball game (pun intended). There are a few reasons WBNA players earn a pittance compared to male players, but the primary reason is the league's revenue. Unlike soccer, the NBA and WNBA are legally two separate entities. The NBA has revenue of $10 billion per year, while the WNBA brings in about $200 million. Players' salaries are based on revenue.
But that's only part of the issue. Both players' unions have collective bargaining agreements with their respective leagues. The men's agreement gives players 50% of the league's revenue. The women's agreement gives them only 10%. If the women's agreement were structured like the men's, Caitlin Clark would have a salary of over $1 million. At least in that case, she'd be earning 1% of her male counterpart...
Low pay has driven some women athletes to play overseas. That's why Brittney Griner was headed to Russia during the WNBA offseason — to earn more money. Playing overseas can lead to dangerous situations, most pointedly Griner's 10-month wrongful detention in Russia.
While the NBA and the WNBA are legally separate entities, they're tied together. The NBA owns 50% of the WNBA and provides an annual endowment of $15 million, which is (checks notes), only slightly higher than the four-year contract offered as a salary to the first draft pick of the NBA. According to this article:
The NBA recognizes the need for a professional women's league. By subsidizing the WNBA, the NBA champions gender equality in sports.
Are we looking at the same numbers? The NBA's subsidy amount is the equivalent of throwing some change on the ground.
I've seen a lot of comments like, "The NBA earns more! Of course their players have a higher salary!"
Let's put this in a business context, like a software company. Salespeople bring in money. But the money they bring in funds the entire organization, including people who don't directly bring in revenue but still have a valuable role to play, like software engineers and customer service. If money weren't used to pay for these other departments, they'd suffer from being underfunded. Which is, arguably, what's happening with the WNBA.
And yes, salespeople are typically rewarded for bringing in sales (like with a commission). But those rewards are tied to their performance. It's possible that some salesperson out there's earning 137 times the amount of employees in other departments (like the male top draft pick compared to Caitlin Clark), but that seems unlikely.
In the world of the 2024 college basketball season, Caitlin Clark is undeniably the highest performer. Yet her earnings are limited by her gender.
Or we can even bring it back and look at a college sports context. Title IX requires schools to provide "equal opportunity in the benefits, opportunities, and treatment provided for their athletic teams." It doesn't matter if the men's team brings in more revenue than the women's team: both teams have to be funded by the school. California's Division 1 schools brought in a combined $1.2 billion in revenue in 2022. Some of the funds subsidize other sports.
Businesses operate as a whole, in order to strengthen the company. Some college sports are subsidized by earnings from other sports.
Yet the NBA looks at the WNBA and says, "Too bad. You're on your own."
Breaking down barriers
The NBA could invest more in the WNBA. More investment could drive more revenue: it's a flywheel effect.
After Clark's salary was announced, former NBA star Shaquille O'Neal said it's up to fans to support female players. He said, "Now that you know about Caitlin... make sure you go out and buy the jerseys, make sure you watch the game, make sure you show up at the games."
That quote is from an insider's perspective. Someone who was on the receiving end of the NBA's unfair pay.
Sports aren't the only industry with massive pay gaps between genders. Actress Taraji P. Henson says she was paid less than 2% of what Brad Pitt earned for The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. She says that Pitt was paid what he deserved, but that she also deserved to be fairly compensated.
(This tactic was mentioned by my friend Rease Rios in my interview with her!)
Unfair pay has to be brought to the forefront. Actress Robin Wright fought for fair pay as fellow actor Kevin Spacey in House of Cards (Spacey was reportedly earning $500k per episode, and Wright was earning $420k p er episode). The cast of Friends banded together so they would all be paid the same. They were doing the same work; they should earn the same pay.
O'Neal is wrong. The burden isn't on the fans to support the teams. Though revenue is certainly a factor, the burden is also on the structural issues contributing to the disparities in the first place: the women's collective bargaining agreement and the lack of investment from the NBA to make the WNBA stronger.
We won't see change unless we get mad about this.
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