We have two basic issues:
Issue 1 - Women's Soccer Has Low Commercial Value. The world-wide market for women's soccer is orders of magnitude less than the world-wide market for men's soccer. The total prize money to be split between the 24 women's teams for 2019 is $30M. The total prize money for the men in 2018 (Russia) was $400M. The 2018 Champion on the men's side recieved $38 Million (the runner up $28 million). Contrast that with the Women's TOTAL prize money being $30 million. and we can already see where the money is.
Why the disparity? Institutional sexism? No. Soccer is entertainment and women are not as entertaining to watch from a world-wide perspective.
Audit shows a record
3.572 billion people watched the 2018 FIFA World Cup Russia™
Figure includes those who watched TV at home, out of home or on digital platforms
The final was seen live by a combined 1.12 billion viewers worldwide.
Source: https://www.fifa.com/worldcup/news/more-than-half-the-world-watched-record-breaking-2018-world-cup
Contrast with the last women's worldcup: "More than
750 million television viewers watched the FIFA Women’s World Cup Canada 2015™"
https://www.fifa.com/womensworldcup...world-cup-tops-750-million-tv-viewers-2745963
On a worldwide basis, based on spectators the men's FIFA World Cup is:
4.76266666667
Times More Popular
Than the women's FIFA World cup.
What is FIFA and its various Governing Bodies doing about this? There is a strategy, but we are only a few years into that strategy, which includes:
- Grow Participation (60 million female players by 2026) (Game Plan Section 1)
- Enhance The Commercial Value (Game Plan Section 2 and 3)
- Build The Foundations (Game Plan Section 4 and 5)
https://resources.fifa.com/image/upload/women-s-football-strategy.pdf?cloudid=z7w21ghir8jb9tguvbcq
Issue 2 - US Soccer CoMingles the Value of USWNT contributions to its overall revenues and doesn't separate perceived values of the two teams based on gender.
With regard to the present lawsuit, US Soccer is its own worst enemy and the USWNT players know it. They also know that the vast amount of the public are idiots and don't look beyond revenues. Hint:
you are an idiot you are myopic if you don't look at "net profit."
When you look at US Soccer's budgets the Women are monetary losers, but before we get to that. Let's also appreciate that the women are looking to maximize their "perceived" value. The failure of the men to qualify for the World Cup was the best thing to happen to the ladies because it required US Soccer to redirect efforts that play into perceived value.
The Fiscal Year 2020 budget - executive summary basically put the ladies up on a "marketing pedestal"
Page 5,
US Soccer 2019 Book of Reports.
The above point is where you all seem to not get it. This isn't about what is their present value, this lawsuit is simply about what is the "perceived" value in terms of marketing and growing the sports to US Soccer.
When we take a look at the FY'20 Projected Source and Use of Funds, the women are clearly bringing in more revenue (given its their World Cup cycle) than the men, but US Soccer is getting hammered on expenses (Page 8,
US Soccer 2019 Book of Reports.)
US Mens National Team
FY'20 Projected Revenue: $20,414,455
FY'20 Projected Expenses: ($21,431,499)
Projected Profit/Loss: ($1,017,044)
US Women's National Team
FY'20 Projected Revenue: 18,503,582
FY'20 Projected Expenses: ($20,801,255)
Projected Profit/Loss: ($2,297,673)
US Women's National Team - World Cup
FY'20 Projected Revenue: 4,454,374
FY'20 Projected Expenses: ($10,582,252)
Projected Profit/Loss: ($6,127,878)
Restated, for Fiscal Year 2020, operating the US MNT will cause US Soccer to lose $1,017,044. Operating the US WNT will cause US Soccer to lose $8,425,551.
What is missing from the above numbers is the revenue related to TV rights and sales of jerseys, etc. at its relates to the Mens v. Women's programs. What we do know is that the projected Revenue for Mktg - Sponsorship - Broadcast is $51,7M, the Projected expenses are $7,827,128 and the projected profit is $43,912,872 for combined rights.
It isn't broken up by men and women, but it would be delusional to think that the women contribute 8x to 10x more for broadcast rights over the men when the TV viewership is much lower for women over men. Where the women probably come close to equality on the marketing front is jersey sales, but its hard to say because the numbers are not broken up by gender.
At the end of the day, if we were just trying to be fair on a "pro rata basis" and give the women the same percentage of what they bring to the table, the USWNT players should be paid less than the men. If we wanted to pay the USWNT players based on their perceived value from a marketing standpoint then we pay them the same or more because America loves winners (as does every other nation).
Make no mistake about any of this, the USWNT players know the score. They are fighting under the banner of equality knowing that their contribute less to the overall revenues and more to the overall costs. They know that you don't understand it. The US Men laid an egg, the USWNT is topped ranked and in a World Cup cycle year and US Soccer's mission to grow the sports needs them right now. Their perceived value hasn't been higher.
The lawsuit IS strategic (even down to the day it was filed - National Women's Day) and designed to get the USWNT players, not their fair share of their economic contribution to US Soccer, but their perceived value, which are two different things.