“The significance of this moment can’t be underestimated,” Jessica Robertson, co-founder and chief content officer at TOGETHXR (a new women’s media and commerce platform launched with Alex Morgan, Sue Bird, Chloe Kim, and Simone Manuel) told Jezebel. “This settlement, in part, is about acknowledging that these women and women’s sports have been significantly undervalued, and intentionally treated and compensated inequitably despite winning, despite revenue, and despite viewership.
TOGETHXR togethxr.com/ Great site btw, not irritating to navigate at all
Id like to see these revenues they speak of, honestly. Jezebel.com must have forgotten to include details to support their own piece. Unexpected.
This is a good comment to the piece. I assume this reader is banned from commenting now
"average The WNBA salary (which was close to $100,000 in 2021) is just 1.5 percent of the average NBA salary (more than $7 million), according to NBCSports."
My kneejerk reaction is to say that it doesn’t makes sense to compare these numbers. Using 2019 numbers (i.e., the before times,) the average NBA player’s salary ($6.4 million) constituted 0.086% of the NBA’s total revenues that year ($7.4 billion). That same year, 2019, the average WNBA player’s salary ($74k) was 0.12% the WNBA’s total revenues ($60 million) — and, mind you, if you Google around this topic for even a couple of minutes, you’ll find a good amount of reporting on the WNBA not actually being profitable, frequently going seven- or eight-figures into the red, and only staying afloat because it’s subsidized by the NBA. That said, average WNBA players’ salaries got a huge bump between 2019 and 2021, with present average salaries around $120,648; I tried to find what the WNBA annual revenue was for 2021, but I kept seeing $60 million, which doesn’t make sense to me (if only because I assume it must be at least a little higher, if only because of inflation.) But even assuming revenues did go up, it’s unlikely they went up by the same roughly 40% that players’ salaries went up.
So that’s my kneejerk reaction, and it’s sort of based on the most basic business/budgeting fundamental (e.g., if you have a 10 employees, and your business’ annual revenues are $5 million, you obviously can’t pay all 10 employees $500k.) The thing is that the WNBA functions less like a regular business and more like a charity: it’s an enterprise that operates at an economic loss, but is kept afloat by the largesse of others (in this case the NBA,) because it is thought to produce something that enriches or improves society by its very existence, and/or is a good unto itself. So when you take that into consideration, I think it probably makes sense to base WNBA player compensation on either (a) the salaries of other charitable organizations’ high-skill workers (e.g., what Médecins Sans Frontières pays physicians; what the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation pays scientists to research AIDS, tb, malaria, measles; etc.) but also taking into account that professional basketball players aren’t going to be able to play the sport at that level for as long as the average doctor will be able to practice; or alternatively (b) just pay every WNBA player the same arbitrary dollar amount based on the degree of the intrinsic “goodness” you think they provide society. I mean, if there are 12 teams, with 12 players per roster, that basically means the WNBA could pay each player $1 million for a total $144 million, which would be like 1.5% of the NBA’s (who is picking up the tab anyway) annual revenue.
Took the kids to the Iowa vs Michigan women's game yesterday. Honestly, it was a good time. Think it cost $35 for the 4 of us, sat at half court (though way up), and Caitlin Clark is absolutely a blast to watch. First women's game sellout at Iowa since 1988 and they won by 25 against the #6 team in the country, and clinched a share of the B1G title. Pretty cool atmosphere.
Post by Untouchable on Mar 6, 2022 10:56:21 GMT -5
wolf: do you think si, espn, etc want Lia Thomas to win the ncaa championship so they can celebrate a civil rights icon making history and triumphing over adversity? or they actually don't want her to win bc the detractors will likely weaponize this?
Last Edit: Mar 6, 2022 10:58:52 GMT -5 by Untouchable
wolf: do you think si, espn, etc want Lia Thomas to win the ncaa championship so they can celebrate a civil rights icon making history and triumphing over adversity? or they actually don't want her to win bc the detractors will likely weaponize this?
How about Brady wouldn't put himself in that position in the first place.
I mean, I get that you think this should be a bigger story. But what the fuck does Tom Brady have to do with anything? Tom Brady is 9 billion times more famous than Brittney Griner (because he's a cishet white man, obviously), so everything that happens to him is a bigger story than the same thing happening to Brittney Griner. This is not complicated.
How about Brady wouldn't put himself in that position in the first place.
I mean, I get that you think this should be a bigger story. But what the fuck does Tom Brady have to do with anything? Tom Brady is 9 billion times more famous than Brittney Griner (because he's a cishet white man, obviously), so everything that happens to him is a bigger story than the same thing happening to Brittney Griner. This is not complicated.
It feels like the initial reaction was "She's being set up by Russia" to more now "Yeah, she was probably travelling with drugs, but so what!?"
