Equality vs. Reality

Gender Equality is a HUGE topic in our world today. What you hear from me on this topic may actually surprise you. I’m going to specifically talk about equal pay in professional athletes. For ex: There has been a lot of talk about the USA Women's Soccer team being the world-championship team and the Men being the 27th ranked in the world, with the USA Men’s Soccer team being paid tremendously more than the women. The men get paid 5 times as much than the women just to get the roster together. Why are the women who are ranked number 1 in the world paid less than the men that are ranked 27th in their respective leagues? I’m going to explain why those type of situations in sports are aligned with reality and are fair. But I’m going to particularly speak about women and men in the wnba and nba. Players in the WNBA are also not getting payed anywhere close, to what the men in the NBA are getting paid. When people are asked, “Should the NBA and WNBA athletes be paid equally,” they answer usually with an impulsive reply, yes! And often it's because they say they work, “Just as hard as the men.” The media and our society has screamed into everyone equality. They give us this blanket statement about women and men being paid equally and confuses almost everyone and blurs the lines of reality. The WNBA and NBA athletes should NOT be paid equally. Because they aren’t equal! For one, the women, from even just a statistical standpoint, don’t do as much as the men and they both play the same game. Two, They are payed as much as their skills are worth and valued by the world. And lastly three, the WNBA and NBA are both separate free market enterprises.

So back to my first point the stats simply aren’t there. If we compare them against each other the WNBA loses in all categories to the men. The women's league leader averaged 23.4 points per game while the men’s league leader averaged 30.1 points per game. The leading rebounder of the women's league gets 9.3 rebounds per game on the other hand the leader of the mens gets 15 rebounds per game. 5.8 assists per game to 10.2 assists per game. Field goal percentage 56.5% to 71%. Anddddd last time I checked most women can’t dunk either haha. I agree with what many of the articles online are saying on this matter, “if they want equal pay they must have equal play.” And the play/stats are blatantly NOT equal.

Next their skills aren’t valued by the market as much as the NBA. so they shouldn’t be payed as much as the NBA players. Even if some of the women do work as hard as the men it doesn’t mean their skills are valued as much as the men. People pay the amount of money they think the franchise is worth. Be it the fan attendance, how much the merchandise sells, t.v. viewers, etc. They pay for what they feel it's worth. The market obviously doesn’t feel like the WNBA is worth more than the NBA. otherwise they would bring in as much revenue as the NBA, therefore bringing in more money to pay the players. There are more interested fans in the NBA so they have more teams than the WNBA. There are only 12 teams in the WNBA and 30 in the NBA. The WNBA womens average game attendance from 2015 is 7,318. While the NBA is 17,809. To put that into a more visual perspective, for those of you who have been in the marriott center (Located in Provo, UT.) the marriott center holds about 19,000. If we were to put all the average fans the NBA got in the marriott it would be completely full except for about the top row. If you put the average fans of the women's it would only take up a third of the arena. Just with average fan attendance the NBA more than doubles the WNBA.

A surprisingly common question people ask is, “Well why doesn't the NBA just give some of their money to the WNBA to make it equal or fair?” What most people don’t realize is that The WNBA and NBA are both separate free market enterprises. Meaning they are their own business. Its their company they get to do what they want with it. They have the right to set salaries. They have the right to do what they want with their money. They don’t have to give more to people or give more money to people just because they are female or that they work just as hard. The NBA and WNBA are separate organizations along with other sports organizations. If any of the players don’t agree with how the organization is being run they can leave and make their own organization and try to get more money. They could set their own salaries. That's the beauty of the free market system.

In Conclusion, The women’s ability/stats, on average aren’t as good or even equal to the men. Their skills aren’t valued to the world as much as the men’s are. The WNBA and NBA are separate free market enterprises, they aren’t related and or even tied together. After examining the specifics of the WNBA, I thought more deeply about my stances. The stances that i’ve taken now in terms of equality and gender equality. Not just for sports but just equality and gender equality in general. It made me start to question where do you draw the line with equality? They talk about movies getting equal pay. Should Barbie Fairytopia and Star Wars be paid equally? Should female actors be paid just as much as the Male actors? Should Xfinity be paid as much as comcast? Where should the line be drawn? I think, this was the wrong question in the first place. I’ve concluded that it is very difficult, if not impossible to say, that there should be gender equality in any field that I can think of. I’ve come to know that they are a fallacy. In reality, I don’t believe equality exists. Nor should it. Nothing in this world is equal. In this world when equality and gender equality are such a big issue and the media/society portraying things more and more seemingly complex and confusing between what is right and wrong, or what is reality and what isn’t, be it the equal pay in women and men, LGBQT rights, gender neutral bathrooms, there are so many issues. I challenge you to think deeper on equality and what your stances are, and maybe even challenge your preconceived ideas and or assumptions.

Thank you.