Soccer women claim wage discrimination
Five stars from the World Cup-winning U.S. women’s national team have accused the U.S. Soccer Federation of wage discrimination in an action filed with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
Alex Morgan, Carli Lloyd, Megan Rapinoe, Becky Sauerbrunn and Hope Solo maintain in the EEOC filing that they are paid nearly four times less than their male counterparts on the U.S. men’s national team, based on U.S. Soccer’s 2015 financial report. The filing was announced Thursday in a statement from the law firm representing the players.
“The numbers speak for themselves,” Solo said in the statement. “We are the best in the world, have three World Cup Championships, four Olympic Championships, and the USMNT get paid more just to show up than we get paid to win major championships.”
U.S. Soccer issued a statement maintaining that its “efforts to be advocates for women’s soccer are unwavering.”
The top players on the women’s team are paid about $72,000 a year by U.S. Soccer, along with bonuses, to play in a minimum of 20 exhibitions per year, the EEOC complaint says. Conversely, the men are paid per match, with a minimum of $5,000 a game.
