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Sue Bird and Lebron James- Sexism and Basketball

 I saw this item from Connecticut senator Saud Anwar-

https://m.facebook.com/SenatorSaudAnwar/photos/a.1176228692554244/2018506154993156/?type=3&source=57

He thanks Tim Appleton for pointing out the disparity in pay between Lebron James and Sue Bird as evidence of unequal pay for women. Prima facie, he's right. Sue Bird makes 215,000 yearly. Lebron James makes 37.4 million, or 173.4 times as much money. A male athlete is making far more than a female athlete of equivalent stature in her sport! This is an outrage! Sexism expressed in money! MEN! Pigs paying their own and keeping women in a position of subservience!

Well, now that the sloganeering is out of the way let's look at the math.....

I think we all agree we should be paid for our work. If you do the same work, you get the same money. That doesn't mean you get paid the same if you put in the same effort or time. What you earn depends on skills, time, and the public desirability of your product. Making toilet paper doesn't bring the same money per ton of paper that making greeting cards does.

The NBA is one of the most popular sports leagues in the United States. Total revenue was actually down 8% last year, at 7.92 billion. The TV contract is 2.6 billion yearly. Average per game attendance for all teams (not the champs) is just short of 18,000 per game. TV viewership average 1.2 million per game. In this context, James' contract represents 0.47% of NBA revenue.

The WNBA has increased substantially in popularity. It's total revenue last year was....60 million dollars, or 0.75% of the NBA's revenue. It's TV contract is for....25 million per year, or 1% of the NBA's contract. Average attendance per game was 6572. Financially the WNBA is dwarfed by the NBA. Sue Bird's contract represents 0.36% of WNBA revenue. 

NBA games are 4 12 minute quarters, 82 games per season. The WNBA is....10 minutes per quarter for 36 games....36!! The WNBA plays a total of 1440 minutes  in a season. The NBA plays 3936 minutes in a season, or 2.73 times as much. 

Sue Bird's salary is thus 149.00 per minute. James' salary is 9502.00 per minute, or 63 times Sue Bird's. NBA revenue is 43 times the WNBA's revenue. Thus, if we were to make Sue Bird's salary equal to Lebron James' in terms of actual minutes and league revenue, Bird's salary needs to increase by 63/43, or multiply by 1.465.

Sue Bird's salary, adjusted for the popularity, productivity, and effort in her sport, should be....315,000.00.

If Sue Bird were paid as much as Lebron James, her salary would consume more than 50% of all WNBA revenue, and she would be paid 118 times what she's worth in market production terms.

It's a serious disservice not simply to society but to women to play the 'sex card' when the woman in question makes neither the effort nor has the productivity of the man in question. Just screaming sexism in this context, and in many others,  alienates anyone who can think, and makes the claimant look like a fool.

Every business, every media outlet, every individual, should look closely at claims of sexism and racism. Do the math and evaluate the situation before you get suckered by loud-mouthed, empty-headed activists....

Ted

Comments

  1. David E.September 24, 2021 at 6:14 PM

    I have no reason to doubt your numbers. You put a lot of thought into this.
    Two comments:
    1. It's still obviously unfair that you're still coming up with a 30% underpayment for Sue Bird. If anybody suggested that female teachers should by rights be paid 30% less than male teachers, they'd (rightly) be howled down.
    2. The sexism that the Senator from the Great State etc. is calling out is not necessarily that of the NBA, but that of the community of basketball fans and the advertisers who cater to them. OK, WNBA's revenue is 0.01% of the NBA. Do they play 0.01% as well? Are the teams only 0.01% as enjoyable/exciting to watch? Don't blame the NBA, blame the fans.
    3. I'm not a fan. Watching a basketball game is slightly more exciting than watching my grass grow. So don't blame me.
    David Epstein (AKA loud-mouthed, empty-headed activist)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Watcher124October 4, 2021 at 12:43 PM

    You can’t compare pay for teachers to commercial enterprise pay. Economics dictates compensation. The WNBA loses around $10 million per year. Which kind of puts a cap on what you can pay the players. I’m a fan. I like watching the women play. But not as much as the men because the men can do much more entertaining things. This is not so in the pop vocalist world, so the economics are more kind to women. When you attempt to adjust price ir supply of a commodity, you eventually affect demand. In this case, amp up the price of wnba labor and either ticket prices would have to climb to compensate and then demand would probably fall if the law of price elasticity is still ruling economics, and quite possibly, the league would collapse. I am never surprised anymore about the lack of awareness about economics, the science of which usually ensures that efforts and investments are fairly compensated for the value they create. Mess with this at your own peril.

    Neil Gillespie

    ReplyDelete

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