The contrasting pay between women’s and men’s sports has been a growing controversy over the past years. Soccer provides an insightful example of the unethical pay gap where, roughly, a woman—who plays soccer at the professional level—makes around 89 cents for every dollar paid to men. Moreover, men, historically, have received much greater bonuses than women. On top of their base salaries, “[The] Women’s USA soccer players make about $25,000 – $85,000 per season, while the average is around $40,000.” This evidently contrasts with the fact that US men players earn roughly around an average of “$100,000 per year.” Attempting to tackle this discrimination, the US Women Soccer Players Association—after years of legal action—have won settlements on discrimination and unequal pay. The American Soccer Association ultimately agreed to pay around $24 million and to make a commitment to equalizing pay and bonuses to match that of the men’s team.

This historic verdict justifies women’s success in fighting against discrimination within sports. Though a significant step in the right direction, society still has a lot of discrimination to fight against across all sports. Another paramount example of this pay gap is how basketball player Stephen Curry was on track to make more than $40 million in salary alone during the 2019–20 season, whereas the highest-paid WNBA player’s salary was $127,500. However, this controversy is supported by the evidence that “there is less market and public interest for female sports competitions, leading to the assumption that they generate less money,” whereas the UCL school of management disagreed stating that “the market follows with the money that athletes are being paid. More salary for athletes makes them more interesting to the public, as evident from professional football players. So, one could argue that we need to pay women more first, and then the market will equalize.” Society has made crucial and historic steps in tackling the uneven pay gap that women have faced throughout time. Women in sports have constantly throughout history been subject to discrimination, and lack proper value for the contribution they bring to the sports work. However, through the association’s legal decision to equal the salaries of women and men, steps are only being taken in the right direction.