The 2023 Women’s World Cup Brings Gender Equity To The Forefront

The 2023 Women’s World Cup begins July 20th when New Zealand takes on Norway. Although this will only be the ninth time the tournament has taken place, the growth of the Women’s World Cup has been tremendous. The 2019 tournament saw a combined 1.12 billion viewers, with an average match viewership draw of almost 17.5 million (double the numbers from 2015). The final match of 2019 (USA v. Netherlands) was the most-watched game in the history of the tournament, peaking at a total of 263.62 million unique viewers. By early June 2023, ticket sales for the 2023 World Cup had already surpassed 1 million, putting it on pace to be the most attended standalone women’s sporting event in history.

Despite these increases, support for women’s soccer from sponsoring nations has not matched growth. Instead, organizational equity initiatives have typically been dwindled down to box-checking efforts, and women athletes have had to rely on extreme measures to achieve results. An all too common issue across sports has been the pay inequities between men’s and women’s national teams. One of the most visible equal pay fights was between the U.S. Women’s National Soccer team and U.S. Soccer and lasted six years, beginning in March 2016. This six-year battle ended with a 24 million dollar settlement and the development of equitable pay models between the men’s and women’s programs.

On the heels of the launch of the USWNT complaint, between the years 2017 and 2020, several nations (Denmark, Norway, Finland, the U.K., and Japan) established equal pay models for their men’s and women’s national teams. These deals left behind some of the most successful and prominent international soccer teams including Germany, the Netherlands, and Canada. The Netherlands did not establish an equal pay agenda until June 2022. The German Women’s National Team still has yet to achieve equal pay, and the Canadian Women’s National Team is currently demanding an equal pay settlement prior to the 2023 Women’s World Cup.

The Canadian team’s equal pay battle is just the latest in a long line of gender equity fights across sports. Coming off their 2021 Olympic gold medal victory, and consistent international success, the Canadian Women’s National team has established their value. That being said, the pressure on Canada to win the 2023 Women’s World Cup to further solidify their worth is far greater than any pressure applied to their men counterparts. This is not an uncommon burden. Women athletes and teams have consistently been forced to outperform their men counterparts and win at the highest levels to establish their value. Men’s teams have never faced these same expectations to maintain and/or increase their worth and subsequent pay.

According to Dr. Ann Pegoraro, the Lang Chair in Sport Management at the University of Guelph and the co-Director of the National Network for Research on Gender Equity in Canadian Sport, “We have made progress, but while we are ‘counting’ women in positions, we are not looking at budgets for women’s teams. Equity is more than just money, but money is still an issue.”

As such, beyond pay equity issues faced by women athletes across soccer, a recent report in The Athletic exposed the overall disparities faced by women soccer players across the world, finding that the shortfalls go well beyond their paychecks. Only 40% of the national team players surveyed considered themselves professional players and 66% had to take time off from another job to prepare and compete in the World Cup. Athletes also self-reported that they are concerned about the lack of equity in training facilities, pitch quality, recovery facilities, unpaid leave from outside employment, and medical care. These concerns are in addition to previous calls to institute equal travel, lodging, and food protocols between men’s and women’s programs. As a result, it has not been uncommon for some women’s national teams to resort to fundraising in an effort to fill in these gaps.

While major disparities remain, this is still an exciting time of growth for women’s soccer, and the Women’s World Cup provides unmatched exposure to incredible teams and athletes every four years. For 2023, eight nations will be making their debut at the Women’s World Cup, a testament to the overall development of the sport for women and girls across the world. Continued global monetary support for women’s soccer will serve to further strengthen the growth, viewership, fandom, and overall popularity for decades to come.