Women's football: equal pay for equal play?

Although some positive steps have been made in recent years, pay for men and women in many sports remains worlds apart. These differences are often evident in prize money, but they are most pronounced in salaries paid by sports teams to their athletes and coaches.

This article will highlight the extent of the pay gap in many professional sports in the UK in 2022 before exploring equal pay laws and how they apply to sports.

The pay gap

The money male footballers earn in this country is often deemed newsworthy. Eye-wateringly astronomical salaries seem to grow to new heights every season. This year (2022), it is estimated that the average annual salary of a premier league footballer will be around £2,800,000. 

Comparatively, the average player’s salary in the UK’s highest tier of women’s football, the Women’s Super League, is estimated to be around £30,000 annually. 

The highest earners in the Premier League will be paid upwards of £20,000,000 per year, whereas the highest earners in the Women’s Super League will be paid around £200,000 per year. 

So the top players (as in football, typically higher wages are delivered to the best players) in the women’s game will earn one per cent as much as their male counterparts. This is also before bonuses, prize money, image rights, and sponsorship deals, all of which are much more lucrative in the men’s game than in the women’s game.

This pay gap does not just exist for players. There is also a vast disparity in pay for managers and coaching staff. England Lionesses head coach Sarina Wiegman is thought to be earning £400,000 per year, whereas Gareth Southgate, manager of the England men’s team, makes around £5,000,000 per year. 

It is worth noting that the Lionesses won the Women’s Euros in 2022, whereas the men’s team have not won a major trophy since 1966.  

As alluded to above, some progress has been made in recent times. The FA now pays men and women representing England the same match fee and the same bonuses. The Welsh FA and Irish FA also pay men and women equal match fees. In 83% of professional sports, equal prize money is offered to men and women. However, the difference in the prize money offered in the 17% of remaining sports is staggering, particularly in football and golf.

The law

The Equal Pay Act 1970 has made equal pay for equal work a requirement for UK employers for over 50 years. Its doctrine has been updated and built upon in the Equality Act 2010. Equal work is defined in three ways according to the legislation:

• Work of equal value
• Work rated as equivalent (such as public sector banding or any work rated as equivalent under a job evaluation scheme)
• “like work”

It is important to note that only one of these categories needs to be applicable in order to justify an equal pay claim.

Football clubs and other sporting bodies are likely to argue that male and female athletes are not producing work of equal value to justify their failure to offer equal pay. Men’s football, they will argue, has a more extensive viewership, and generates higher revenues, which is why male footballers are compensated at a higher level. 

It is true that men’s football, and indeed men’s sports in general, garners more attention than women’s sports. However, one could argue that this is partly due to a lack of availability. Despite making up 40% of the total participants in sports, only 4% of sports media coverage is devoted to women’s sports. 

Therefore, one may deduce that in the case of football players, women are not put into a position by their clubs, the FA, or the media to generate support, viewership, and revenue as readily as men.

“Like work” is more likely to be the term that could be used to bring forth a claim for equal pay. Typically, “like work” is a term used to describe work performed by two employees that is broadly similar enough to be considered equal. 

Assessing this would involve looking at the skills and knowledge required to carry out said work and then deciding if any present differences are relevant enough to justify a significant difference in pay.

Exemptions to equal pay

Differences in pay can be legal in exceptional circumstances. The reasoning, however, must have nothing to do with someone’s gender. Exemptions include:

• One individual is better qualified for the role, and the skills necessary for the job mean it is hard to recruit
• Location – for example, the cost of living in London is higher than the rest of the UK, so a pay difference for an individual working in London may be acceptable.
• If the individual works night shifts and the employer can prove they can only cover night shifts by paying staff more

This is a complex area of law, and every case depends on the facts. A legal difference in pay in one situation may be illegal in another, so it is always best to seek legal advice before offering contracts for different pay.

Why sports are unique

The issue of gender equality in professional sports is unique because, for the most part, the labour markets for male and female sportspersons are artificially segregated from one another. 

The Equality Act 2010 has a provision which stops claims being issued pertaining to discrimination about participation in sporting activities. This provision says that if the sport is “gender affected”, then claims cannot be levied to force participation. 

To be “gender affected”, it must be demonstrable that the physical differences between men and women would create an advantage or disadvantage for one gender over the other. 

If gender segregation was abolished, allowing female sportspersons to play for traditional male teams or against male competitors in the case of individually competed sports, then it would be reasonable to assume that pay for women in sports would increase significantly due to the Equality Act 2010.

As it is unlikely (and for many female sportspersons, likely unwanted) that gender segregation in sports will be abolished; it is, therefore, hard to foresee a case being brought forward which leans upon the Equality Act 2010 to force parity in pay for male and female footballers. As such, less formal methods will likely yield greater success for women. Methods such as:

• Increasing public pressure,
• Increasing advocacy, and
• Increasing public awareness

In addition to:

• Endeavouring to increase viewership of women’s football and other women’s sporting events

Methods such as these are most likely to result in increased salaries. As public discourse around this topic increases, it would appear that steps are being taken in the right direction, but there are many more steps yet to be taken before true parity is achieved.

US Women’s National Team

It was announced in May 2022 that the US Men and Women’s National teams would be paid equally. The US Soccer organisation announced on Twitter:

“In a historic accomplishment, US Soccer, USMNT and USWNT have come together to agree to new collective bargaining agreements that will run through 2028 and achieve true equal pay – including equalisation of World Cup prize money”.

The collective bargaining agreements include equal pay for all competitions, including the World Cup. Furthermore, the two teams will pool all their prize money from the World Cups and split the total between both teams. The US are the first country in the world to do this.

This announcement comes subsequent to the settlement agreed upon in February, where the organisation agreed to pay the two teams equally in the next union contract and give the Women’s team $22m in back pay.

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