Everyone (a record 25 million – the highest rating for a soccer game on a single network in the U.S.) tuned in to watch the U.S. women’s World Cup soccer team crush Japan in a sensational 5-2 victory.
Social media lit up with excitement, but amid all the coverage I found this article from Her Campus.
“A troubling reality of gender inequality is becoming visible. Consider this fact: The U.S. team won roughly $2 million for the World Cup title, whereas the men’s champion team last year, Germany, received some $35 million for their win (and even more in endorsements). To put that amount in even more perspective, the U.S. women’s team earned four times less than the men’s team which lost in the first round of the FIFA World Cup last year.”
Excuse me??? Wait, there’s more.
“Top soccer players like Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi make millions of dollars every year, when the top paid female player, Marta Viera da Silva of Brazil, makes just $400,000. Alex Morgan of the U.S. team was estimated to have made $450,000 last year, mostly through endorsements and sponsors (because the National Women’s Soccer Leagues caps the salary at just $200,000). And Wambach only made somewhere between $190,000 to $300,000. These women are ranked as the highest paid, yet they earn only a small fraction of their male counterparts.”
This is a serious problem that needs to be addressed, and it is upsetting that this issue would not be brought up if the women’s team had not received so much media attention. You can sign this petition to help encourage FIFA into equal pay for the men’s and women’s teams. FIFA’s secretary general called equal pay for women “nonsense” and that “we are still another 23 World Cups before potentially women should receive the same amount as men.” That’s 92 more years of pay discrimination. The petition declares “equal pay can’t wait another century. Pay women players fairly.”
“Of course, soccer isn’t the only sport where women are paid less than their male counterparts–just about every other major sport has some type of pay gap. Perhaps this is just a small reflection of the greater divide which exists globally in all professions. We just hope that with more attention, this injustice might have a chance of being resolved (or at least lessened).”
