Professionalisation and pay equity

When comparing men's and women's sport it is often difficult to determine how much athletes or teams earn or are paid. Payments for teams and competitions can include sponsorships, broadcast deals, match fees, etc. For athletes, payments can include match fees, performance bonuses, allowances, wages, retainers, commercial sponsorships, and grants or scholarships. Not all income or earnings are required to be publicly declared. ⁸⁶

Some examples of Collective Bargaining Agreements (CBA) in Australian sports that provide information on payments for women athletes include rugby, cricket, Australian football, netball, basketball, and football. ^{87, 88, 89, 90, 91, 92}

While these CBAs have improved women athletes' pay levels and conditions, most still need to maintain outside employment to cover living costs and other expenses. ^{17, 82, 83, 84, 85}

Internationally, sports are also looking to address historical gender imbalances in payments and professionalisation.⁹³

• FIFA, the world body for football, announced an increase in prize money for the 2023 Women’s World Cup to US$150 million, three times the amount that was awarded in 2019. Additionally, they plan to have equal payments for the 2026 Men’s and 2027 Women’s World Cups and committed to players and coaching staff having the same conditions (e.g., base camps, accommodation, flights), starting with the 2023 Women's World Cup hosted in Australia and New Zealand. ⁹⁴
• After controversy in 2021 surrounding inequity of facilities, funding, and resources provided to the men’s and women’s US National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) basketball championships, the NCAA commissioned two reports to investigate increasing gender equity. The recommendations indicated that combining championships “for a given sport enables more coordinated planning, increases equity in the goods and services, facilities, and resources provided at the championships and eliminates or reduces disparities between the 'look and feel' of the tournaments.” ^{95, 96}
• In March 2021, the England and Wales Cricket Board (EBC) established the Independent Commission for Equity in Cricket (ICEC) to investigate and assess evidence of inequalities and discrimination within all forms of cricket. The final report, released in June 2023, highlighted that the lived experiences and structural barriers for women in cricket at all levels demonstrate that women continue to be treated as subordinate to men. Following the ICEC Report, the ECB committed to spending the next several months considering the recommendations and developing a new action plan with stakeholders from across the sport. ^{142, 143}

Although there has been progress, and women’s elite and professional athletes and sports are increasingly being recognised for their skill, dedication, and entertainment value, there are still many challenges as they work towards professionalisation and pay equity with long-standing men’s competitions and events. ^{16, 17, 77, 78, 79, 80, 81, 140, 141, 144}

“Achieving sustainable pay equality where women's sport is valued equally to men's requires buy-in and a significant shift in mindset across the entire sports ecosystem. This includes sports organisations, governments, news media, fans, broadcasters, corporate supporters, athletes, players' associations and international sports bodies.”⁷⁷

Champions of Change, Pathway to Pay Equality: Elite women athletes, (2019)

Resources and reading