Basketball Compensation: Women v$. Men

“…The salary cap for an entire NBA team… is $58.679 million whereas the salary cap for an entire WNBA team… is $913,000.”  Evidently, Nicole Fourman, the author of this article, depicts how the salaries of the players in the two basketball leagues have an exponential difference.  This statement alone outlines the professional league.  As for the colligate league, “the male head coaches earn $121,815 on average compared to female head coaches, who bring in $81,255.”  Correspondingly, Sarah Tranelli, the news reporter of this topic in The Athens NEWS, describes the salary cap of colligate coaches in terms of males and females.  In consideration with coaches and players, basketball impacts women’s salaries negatively than men’s.

In the first place, female coaches and players sense the discrepancy of their salaries compared to what men are getting paid.  In “Pay for Women’s Basketball Coaches Lags Far Behind That of Men’s Coaches,” the article states, “… the women’s basketball coach, Sylvia Hatchell, earns about one-third of what the men’s coach, Roy Williams, makes each year… Hatchell has won one national title… and Williams has won two.”  While this quote is logical, Hatchell should get paid half of Williams’s salary because of their championship status.  In reality, that dream for women to even make two-thirds as much money as men will never happen because of how women’s salaries are portrayed to those of men’s.  Embedded in the article “Equal Pay? Not on the Basketball Court,” Tamika Catchings quotes, “…it honestly hasn't been brought to my attention, but it's a true statement…”  Tamika Catchings, arguably one of the best women to play the game of basketball, spoke her mind when she cited that the salary cap for the WNBA needs to rise, presenting the idea on how WNBA players do not stack as much as NBA players do because if the highest-paid WNBA player is somewhat complaining about the pay, then there definitely should be a change.  Her statistics compared with Kevin Garnett, a highly-paid NBA player, Tamika exhibits more honors and credentials, yet she is not as paid as Kevin Garnett.  By the same token, the passage “Pay for Women’s Basketball Coaches Lags Far Behind That of Men’s Coaches” indicates, “…the median salary for [men] coaches [were] $329,300, nearly twice that of [women] coaches… who had a median of $171,600.  Over the past four years, the median pay of men’s… increased by 40 percent compared with the 28 percent [of women’s]…”  Since this quote creates a small amount of confusion, if men are getting paid twice as much than women, why is the percent of increase fairly higher for men than women?  Men are already getting paid more, so why should their salary increase be higher?  On the whole, women typically cannot make more money than men do.  As sad as this epidemic is, I only see one way that women can make more money: wait patiently until a global pay raise showers down from the heavens.

As nearly important to my first claim, the female coaches and players are financially affected by the compensation in the NBA and WNBA.  Portrayed in “Pay for Women’s Basketball Coaches Lags Far Behind That of Men’s Coaches,” the excerpt mentions, “Summitt’s annual compensation of $2.2 million is actually more than that of the men’s coach at Tennessee, Cuonzo Martin, who just finished his first season and earns $1.6 million.”  Even though Cuonzo Martin earns just under $600,000 under Pat Summitt, the veteran coach for the Tennessee Volunteers, he obviously does not display as much experience as Pat Summitt, expressing that he almost breaks even with her financially.  Identically, as Martin continues coaching at Tennessee, he will eventually smoke Pat Summitt simply because he is a man.  In the same fashion, the passage “Equal Pay? Not on the Basketball Court” specifies, “…Catchings’s career earnings are an estimated $3 million to $4 million, including [endorsements]… and Garnett’s? $291 million, excluding endorsements…”  Mathematically, for every million Catchings produces, Garnett dominates her by a whopping $73 million; while not even considering women in the mix of such money, that type of pay should not be necessary in granting to men.  Provided that his salary is eye-opening, Kevin Garnett not only makes 73 times the amount Catchings earns, but he can literally sit on his couch all day, consuming chips and Cheetos, and gross over twice as much money than Catchings obtains with endorsements alone!  According to the article “WNBA Salaries Are a Reflection of Interest,” Bill Rieber, an economics professor at Butler University, notifies, “the NBA has been in place since 1946; they [have] a 50 year head start over the WNBA and the WNBA is just catching up.”  On one hand, Bill Rieber indicates how men have more of a reason to get paid so much than women do because of all the entertaining dunks and crafty passes they show out on the court.  Even though this is a valid statement, on the other hand, I say that women deserve to obtain more money because they perform the same overall task as the men do: to play the game of basketball.  Given these points, men strictly get paid more than women even if both genders hold the same profession, but in the basketball industry, the amount men receive ridiculously reveals how women’s salaries are jokes compared to men’s.

As can be seen financially, basketball happens to be a flourishing business for both the men and women leagues; the industry also prospers in the colligate level too.  As the years progress, sooner or later, the compensation for women will increase vastly as long as they continue to stay humble.  In simplicity, many societies impact the roles of males and females, yet in this situation, men will always come out on top if the matter is about money; however, if women keep hoping and persevering, they will one day come out on top and start piling paper more than men can even imagine.

Works Cited

Fourman, Nicole. "WNBA Salaries Are a Reflection of Interest." Indianapolis Recorder Newspaper. BLOX Content Management System. 8 Aug. 2013. Web. 31 Jan. 2014.

Gentry, James K., and Raquel M. Alexander. "Pay for Women’s Basketball Coaches Lags Far Behind That of Men’s Coaches." The New York Times. 6 Apr. 2012. Web. 14 Jan. 2014.

Tranelli, Sarah. "Coaches’ Salaries Show Wide Gender Disparity in MAC: It’s All About Money... Or Is It?" The Athens News. The Athens News. 7 Apr. 2013. Web. 10 Feb. 2014.

Woods, David. "Equal Pay? Not on the Basketball Court." USA Today. 19 May 2012. Web. 12 Jan. 2014.