The Gender Pay Gap In Professional Sports
By: Tommy DeLaunay and Jonathan Hudson
The sport industry in general is one of the largest industries in the world and by far one of the most profitable. In a 2018 Forbes study, forty out of the top one-hundred highest paid athletes were professional basketball players in the National Basketball Association (NBA). The names known around the world by fans such as LeBron James, Kevin Durant, and Stephen Curry were obviously at the top of the list; however the top athletes in the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA) were completely absent from the list. Not only was there no representation from the WNBA, there also was not a single female athlete in the top one-hundred. Serena Williams, arguably the greatest tennis player of all time, was the highest paid female athlete in 2018 and failed to crack the top one-hundred. She took in just over eighteen million dollars, four million behind the one-hundredth player on the list. There is undoubtedly a wage gap between male and female professional athletes and arguably between all male and female in the workplace. By drawing more positive attention to the WNBA it can help draw more viewership and sponsorship to the brand. WNBA and NBA players deserve equal compensation for their time and effort in professional basketball and revamping the league’s collective bargaining agreement is the first step to doing so. It does not end there as the WNBA needs to promote itself to more people in unique ways.
WNBA players are petitioning for a higher pay, even comparing their salaries to those of NBA players. The common misconception is that WNBA players are bidding for NBA equal $100 million plus contracts but they know that is completely unreasonable with the amount of money the league makes. The NBA is expected to make over $9 billion in revenue this season all the while the WNBA will make just around $60 million (Fader 2018). Sue Bird, one of the greatest WNBA players of all time, said in a recent interview “Look, we’re not over here saying we should be paid the same as the men. We’re realistic. We understand that this is a business and that their revenue is insane compared to ours. But there is a bias that exists.” (Voepel 2018.) According to the WNBA’s collective bargaining agreement (CBA) only around a quarter of league revenue is allocated to player salaries whereas in the NBA’s CBA states nearly half of league revenue goes to player salaries.
Now, the WNBA is not as profitable as the NBA as teams. They do not have nearly the same ticket sales nor is their television contract worth billions. In the 2017 season, the total attendance for the twelve WNBA teams topped 1.5 million. The league’s average attendance per game of 7,716 was a new high (Lough 2018).
In 2017 the average salary for a WNBA player was just over $70,000 and the most a veteran player can make is $113,500. Looking at the NBA, the minimum league salary of a player is $838,464, regardless of their experience. In comparison the minimum salary of a WNBA player is just over $40,000, a barely livable amount considering the amount of expenses professional athletes have. The WNBA Players Union head Terri Jackson is concerned with the safety of the players and the lack of accommodations made for them while on the road during the season. WNBA teams have to fly coach and teams are not allowed to charter even if they choose to. In addition to poor flying standards players who have four or less years of playing experience in the league have to share hotel rooms. There is no conceivable way to argue that WNBA players should not at least have the same travel standards as their male counterparts. To make enough money to continue to perform at the highest level, the top WNBA Americans travel overseas, usually to China, for salaries astronomically higher than in the United States during the offseason.
Fixing the issue starts at the WNBA’s CBA. The original agreement was supposed to last through 2019 but the WNBA Players Association chose to opt out a year early to start renegotiating the terms of the document. Fighting for a higher, more set, compensation league revenue is the top priority. It goes deeper than just demanding a higher pay scale as there will need to be even more revenue brought in so the league can still profit as a whole. They have to find a way to attract fans who do not normally watch sports to the WNBA over other associations and leagues. The WNBA has taken great strides to widening their fanbase but still have work to do.
In 2009 the WNBA decided to allow sponsors to place their logo on a team’s jersey. This was controversial at the time as most other professional sport organizations in the United States voted against it. In European basketball league both male and female teams have jersey sponsors which draw a lot of money to the team. Leagues, like the WNBA, that do not make as much money by ticket sales should look into expanding jersey sponsors. In 2017 the NBA followed suit and allowed sponsors on team jerseys. Along with jersey sponsors the WNBA allows premium sponsors to place logos on the courts and sidelines (Lough 2018.)
Another market the WNBA has started to focus on and should continue to pursue is the LBGTQ community. In 2016 the WNBA became the first professional sports organization to participate in the New York City Pride Parade. In a recent study, 25% of WNBA fans identified as lesbian, the most of any sport (Morris 2014). Targeting the fifteen million Americans that identify themselves within the LGBTQ community can help bring real passionate fans to the league. The WNBA has started to host pride nights and have events tailored to that community. In the 2018 WNBA All Star game almost one third of the rosters identified as lesbian or gay.
Researchers have found that fans and consumers respond more favorably to marketing initiatives that are tailored to their identities. Former President of the WNBA Laurel Richie said “For us it’s a celebration of diversity and inclusion…of an audience that has been with us very passionately.”
The WNBA is also trying to connect with fans through social medias and live stream games on different media outlets. During the 2017 season the league aired twenty live games on Twitter. Fanduel, a leading daily fantasy sports website, has started incorporating WNBA games within its games and contests. On top of all of that the WNBA made its first appearance in a video game featuring in EA Sports’ “NBA Live 18.” With the legalization of sports gambling across the country this is a market that the WNBA can pounce on marketing their games in a way as to make money. There are live betting apps that the WNBA can partner with easily. Live betting is a concept that people can bet during the game. Individuals can make bets on what they think they next play will be or the result of it. This concept keeps people involved throughout the whole game and promotes viewership. Promoting the streaming of games overseas is another market that the WNBA can hit. Basketball is one of the fastest growing sports overseas and the opportunity to profit off of that is golden. Streaming games internationally can bring in fans from across the world from all different cultures.
With all of these positive strides for the WNBA, their merchandise sales increased by eighteen percent in 2017 and across ESPN2 and NBA TV viewership is up thirty-five percent, while the NBA is down overall. (Voepel 2018). Along with the increase of sales increasing: attendance, viewership, and social media following increased. There is optimism because the WNBA is only twenty-one years into its existence. When the NBA was in its twenty-first season it had inferior ticket sales and attendance than the WNBA does currently. Continuing to find a consistent target audience is key for the WNBA to increase its growth.
Podcast Link: https://youtu.be/5cX3zjiGfKM
Podcast Link (Audio Only): https://drive.google.com/file/d/1FS5cpsYHJV7_I4nO2s1UQhPD11iU9MZH/view?usp=sharing
Draft is above
Sources:
Brief, C. (2018). Gender pay gap persists. Nature: International Journal of Science, 553(241), 2–3. Retrieved December 1, 2018, from https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-00113-6.
Bamford, C. (2018) Is there actually a gender pay gap? Veterinary Record 182, 232–233.
Fader, M. (2018, October 30). Inside the WNBA’s Fight for Higher Pay. Retrieved December 1, 2018, from https://bleacherreport.com/articles/2802759-inside-the-wnbas-fight-for-higher-pay
Lancet. (2018). Closing the gender pay gap: When and how? The Lancet,391(10129), 14–20, 1455. Retrieved November 30, 2018, from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0140673618308377.
Lough, N. (2018, September 19). The case for boosting WNBA player salaries. Retrieved
December 1, 2018, from
https://theconversation.com/the-case-for-boosting-wnba-player-salaries-100805
Morris, K. (2014, May 28). Coming Out: WNBA Cites LGBT Fan Base at 25 Percent. The Seattle Lesbian. Retrieved December 2, 2018, from http://theseattlelesbian.com/coming-out-wnba-cites-lgbt-fan-base-at-25-percent/
Oakenfull, Gillian & Mccarthy, Michael & B Greenlee, T. (2008). Targeting a minority without alienating the majority: Advertising to gays and Lesbians in mainstream media. Journal of Advertising Research. 48. 191–198.
Silver, A., & Paul, C. (2017, January 19). National Basketball Association Collective Bargaining Agreement. Retrieved December 2, 2018, from http://3c90sm37lsaecdwtr32v9qof-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/2017-NBA-NBPA-Collective-Bargaining-Agreement.pdf
Voepel, M. (2018, August 01). Why substantially increasing WNBA player salaries is more complex than you think. Retrieved December 3, 2018, from http://www.espn.com/wnba/story/_/id/24247429/why-increasing-wnba-player-salaries-more-complex-think
