The obvious difference in sports is that next to nobody watches women's sports vs men's. There's no advertising money in it.

I'd rather men get paid as much as women, nobody should be a multimillionaire just for playing a fucking game.

@1:

Soccer may be the exception to that: for example, the women's World Cup victory over Japan last summer was the most-viewed match in U.S. soccer history.

@1 -- Next to nobody watches women's sports? That must be why last year's women's US Open tennis final sold out faster than the men's.

The U.S. Women will definitely outdraw the U.S. Men in the Rio Olympics.

@2, That stat may be true here, but outside the US? Not so much. Nothing, really NOTHING comes close to global viewership of the mens World Cup matches. If the US mens team made the finals? Yeah, I'm sure that would beat the women's numbers and nobody would ever shut up about it forever. Anyway, I'm sure that the women are being shortchanged here. I'm just not sure that anyone is going to be able to pin it to WC performance in order to decide by how much they're being shortchanged. It's just too much of an apples and oranges comparison. The men who play on the USMNT are (or should be) the stars in their pro leagues who get paid a lot of money to play in the big leagues. The women on the other hand, are players in a much smaller league that barely scrapes by and doesn't get nearly the kind of viewership and sponsorship money. If they were equal leagues with equal TV deals and sponsors, yeah this would be easy to run the numbers and say by how much the women are shortchanged.

@6, Tennis is not soccer. Since I don't watch any tennis at all, I have to ask if the women there make as much as the men? I hope so. If they don't then they have a real beef with whoever is running that show. That case could easily be shown. Soccer however isn't at that point where the women's matches have gained that kind of attention outside of that Womens World Cup final last summer. The Seattle Reign doesn't pull 30-50,000 spectators every week like the Sounders do. It'd be great if they did, but we're just not there yet.

@7, Yeah, if the USMNT even makes it to Rio.

I think, if you want to use revenue generated as a basis for player pay - which I think is a fair way to get about it - it's disingenuous to use last year's numbers as a basis for that argument. How about 4-year rolling number so it's not so biased as to who had a World Cup in the previous year?

I see that very few people actually read the article where it clearly states that the USSF's own financial report states that the women's team brought in more revenue last year.

Their budget reports also state that they expect this trend to continue at least until 2017. The women's team should strike until they get a wage they are willing to work for.

@11 - doesn't matter; they're women.

@5 It seems relevant to me, being as she is ostensibly the public face of this campaign, for the moment.

@13 it doesn't follow that because Hope Solo is an alcoholic who uses physical violence on people she is close to that the USWNT therefore doesn't deserve equal pay.

After all, I'm sure almost all the signers of the Constitution were Slaveowners, we ain't tearing that thing up.

@8 Re: tennis prize money. Slightly different system since they're chasing prize money and aren't salaried, but men and women are competing for the same prizes in their respective events. Just for what it's worth.

http://fortune.com/2015/07/07/soccer-pay…

@15 - how about "it's taking US Soccer just as long to bother themselves about female offenders as it took the NFL, MLB et al. to bother themselves about male offenders"?

Totally fair.

@8:

So what? We're not talking about teams or leagues based in other countries, nor about foreign viewership; the subject at-hand is the U.S Women's Soccer Team. Their matches are broadcast on U.S. television networks, their league and individual teams are sponsored mostly by U.S. companies, their fan base is primarily in the U.S., and they're demanding equal recognition, not with Premier League or FIFA teams, but with their U.S. men's counterparts, who get paid considerably more, but have far less to show for their inferior efforts in international match competition.

@11, No kidding? If the USWNT is bringing in more money than the USMNT then yeah, they should be paid at least equally. The only thing that I could think of that wouldn't make that work is if we're comparing a World Cup year for the women to a non World Cup year for the men.
@18, Even though I basically agree with your view, the salaries for the mens leagues does factor in here. They get paid more in Premiere League and MLS so they expect to get paid for their USMNT appearances on a similar level. I guess someone at US Soccer figures that if the women don't make much outside the Internationals, why pay them the same as the men? Doesn't mean it's right, it's just what I'm guessing the pay was based on. If US Soccer is pulling in the same revenue for the women as the USMNT then yeah, absolutely they should be paid the same!

@9: The US Men failed to qualify for Rio. That was my point.

USSF says "We have been a world leader in women's soccer and are proud of the commitment we have made to building the women's game in the United States over the past 30 years."
I would suggest that USSF did not build the women's game in the United States but it is the beneficiary of Title IX and college game. There were innumerable former or current US college players in last years World Cup playing for other countries. The old boys club of FIFA and USSF will only embrace gender equity when forced by the likes of Loretta Lynch.

Actors and actresses and sports players dont they sign contracts.If you signed a contract,quit bitching