Like the hockey women, the female footballers are whingeing about not being paid like the men for what they perceive to be the same work. While Bokolis' cock-jerk reaction is to guffaw and to tell them to get paid like men, go earn like the men, I grudgingly admit that the issue might be a little more nuanced than that.
But, Bokolis will say that equal pay for equal work is bullshit. Negotiations are all about leverage, which is a catchphrase that really means a side's ability to bully. When you don't own the factors of production, your ability to bully is limited.
Bokolis will now dismiss the merits of their case. I actually did some poking around on this.
The USWNT claims that because they do better than the men do in international competition, that entitles them to draw at least as much water as the men. More accurately, they do comparatively better than the men.
This is because the US women have a relatively higher-level of athlete in their talent pool and because the US women had a head start on most of the world, certainly the nations that would be considered top among the men (Germany, England, France, Spain, Italy). Germany caught up; France caught up; England and Spain are catching up; Italy haven't yet reconciled that women are allowed to be something other than mothers or whores, and the Dutch women seem to be committed elsewhere. Others will eventually catch up, and the rankings of the US men and women will converge.
If the best male athletes in the US focused on (soccer) football, even with a lack of quality coaching, we would pound the rest of the world back into the dark ages, crushed as they would be that we took their sport away from them. Ironically, that would do more for the women's game than anything the USWNT have ever done.
They do not do better than the men, as they do not play the same competition; they play against a talent pool that isn't as developed, or as deep. Would you like us to take off the governor and put you in against men? After enough ass-whuppings, at some point, evolution will smile on women and they'll be the physical equals of men. Society would have broken down by then, and we'd probably have had an ice age or two, affording women even more chance to better their place in its reconstruction. But that also presumes that women would have evolved to be the hunting equals of men- and equally adept at avoiding being the hunted- which is how we got the drop on them in the first place.
Before that, if we dropped the current USWNT into the fourth tier of English (Men's) Football- League Two- for a full season, they would most likely get relegated. Bokolis is told the league average wages (using 2017-18 figures, employ an inflation multiplier accordingly) is about 1000GBP/week, or 46000GBP ($60k USD, rounding up) per full season. Once they were relegated to the
On the basis of percentage of revenue generation, the failed leagues demonstrate that the women cannot draw anywhere near the men. This is even the case in the US, where the WUSA, WPS, W-league, WPSL Elite have folded and the NWSL is still trying to gain traction. All this, while MLS chugs along just fine, despite those guys being just a little better than Bokolis was. At least in the US, the women's clubs function independently of the men's. In Europe, the women's teams are typically arms of a larger (men's) club.
Sure, as revenue earners, the USWNT compares far better in relation to its male counterpart than does the rest of the world. In the US, 'soccer' is perceived as the girls sport- that is, it is the sport females are best equipped to play. Said another way, it is the sport we'd most prefer our girls to play. You've got seventh-generation American fathers, who wouldn't be caught dead watching soccer, mindlessly putting their daughters into soccer because it seems like the thing to so. This has been going on for a couple of generations and, as a consumer group, American women- despite what they tell you- have a standard of living suitable to support their national team.
"Girl Power" and all that notwithstanding, women in the rest of the world still prefer men's football to women's football.
As such, taken in total, the men's world cup cycle generates 40x-50x the revenue that the women's world cup cycle generates. Said another way, for every billion that the men's game generates, the women's game generates $20-$25 million. Nonetheless, the WC prize pool for women is already at a greater payout rate than for the men. This is actually understandable, as there are far greater carrying costs associated with the men, who are far more greatly valued assets. If Sheikh Mansour puts in a bid for Alex Morgan- well, you've heard what happens on those yachts- whatever he pays is barely going to eat into what City will get by selling Leroy Sané back to a German side.
The players suffer further humiliation by having the lords of the game- and a few other chauvinists- suggest that they'd be more of a draw if they played in revealing, form-fitting and otherwise more suggestive outfits. Does it need to be said that this could also be harmful, even dangerous? The fucked up thing is, as it is a weighing machine in the short term, these fuckers would be right in the short run.
Amazingly enough, Bokolis does not want this. I like my sex with my sex, and my sports with my sports. Some hornbag will make youtube videos cherry-picking the best-looking asses of female volleyball players in those shorts and get a bunch of people to look. Still, I'd rather see the pros of the skin trade, swimsuit models and porn whores, in those outfits than athletes. Seeing pics of Hope Solo's nasty looking growler- even though that was not meant for our consumption- was bad enough. Seeing Megan Rapinoe in the swimsuit issue was a soul-scarrer of a train-wreck. I'd much rather watch them play football than shake their asses.
Aside- ever since Bokolis let a female friend convince me that Alex Morgan was not that hot, I've never been able to judge the looks of any of them. In fact, when I saw Julie (Johnston) Ertz WAGged out at Super Bowl 52, my first thought was alarm that she may have given up football. Of course, she has been playing professionally the whole while, but I'd never know.
Besides- and, Bokolis will blow that fantasy right out of the water for you- for the most part, jocks, female and male, are weird. But, hey, they've got to earn, so go on with your patronage. I'll try to reel this back in, while also trying to forget about Rapinoe in a thong.
So, they don't measure up physically, and they don't earn like the men. To boot, as opposed to doing their own thing, they have submitted their game to the patriarchal FIFA's rule. Nonetheless, the women are effectively asking that the cash cow that is the men's game (further) subsidize the women's game by bringing pay in line with the men- in effect, to bump up the women just for the sake of doing it.
hmmmm....ok, Bokolis will bang it around.
Training should be funded as closely to equal as is feasible all the way up and down the age levels, and elite-level women should not have to train and play on crappy turf fields, which would be unconscionable in the men's game.
As far as being paid, the reality is women's football is currently a second class sport, and there is a certain amount of grinning and bearing it that female footballers will have to suffer from choosing a calling that doesn't fund itself. If schoolteachers have to suffer and no one cares, no one is going to give a fuck about the lot in life of a female footballer. That said, Bokolis thinks there is little to be gained by being ruthlessly pragmatic. Continuing to treat them like second-class citizens could quite possibly damage revenue on the men's side by turning women off to the men's game.
The American women, in particular, attempt to invoke Title IX, intended for federally funded and/or educational institutions, and assert that it should apply in this case. Bokolis scratches his head, as, not only does Title IX involve entities that are not intended to be profitable (which FIFA most certainly is not), Title IX is the main roadblock to ANY college athletes getting paid.
While the education aspect is certainly not applicable, Bokolis isn't sure that the "Federal financial assistance" aspect of Title IX is applicable here. Even if it is, it probably wouldn't be much of a problem for USSF to forego any federal funding, thus being able to tell the women to go fuck themselves. Even if they get some of what they want from their federation, while the USWNT would be improving its own situation, it would seem a bellwether, but none of this would necessarily apply to other nations.
FIFA takes a big chance by alienating the US Women. FIFA has gained much from the US market, even as it has barely tapped the well. It is not the wisest thing to do anything that could jeopardize that income stream. Is FIFA going to come through for all federations? The answer is, not until it figures out how to make itself look like a superhero for doing so.
As it is, Ada Hegerberg, a Norwegian considered the best female footballer, has declined to play in this World Cup. Her reasons are not entirely clear, but it is evident that she is sick and tired of the way FIFA and the national federations treat the women's game. Even if she is the best player, she is just one woman, and the competition will shrug it off.
If the USWNT, whether as champions or not, were to boycott the next World Cup (to take place, presumably, in Australia), it would make a dent. If the US boycotts AND whoever wins this year (France?) boycotts the next WWC, then it would be a sham. If you lose the American woman as a consumer, the women's game is in trouble, and it's going to do no favors to the men.
Y'all muthafuckas didn't think I was going to do predictions, did you?
Y'all muthafuckas didn't think I was going to do predictions, did you?
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