After celebrating the Washington Mystics and their remarkable run to the WNBA championship, it’s important to take a minute to think about how we treat these athletes the rest of the year, especially whether or not they are fairly compensated.
Consider that the Sacramento Kings pay Dewayne Dedmon $13.3 million a year, which barely allows him to crack the top 100 among all NBA players, according to data compiled by ESPN.com.
That’s enough money to cover the WNBA’s entire payroll this season.
It’s outrageous that the total compensation for the 200 women on WNBA rosters doesn’t even add up to what a mediocre NBA team is willing to pay a journeyman center. The top salary in the WNBA is capped at $117,500. The median salary is closer to $55,000.
If you think that’s simply a reflection of their value, it is not. If you think it’s because the WNBA is losing money, it’s not. If you think it’s because nobody attends games, it’s not.
The NBA spends about 50% of league revenues on payroll, according to an analysis by Forbes magazine. On the other hand, the WNBA spends about 25% of league revenues on payroll.
The sports giant ESPN paid the WNBA $25 million a year for broadcast rights in 2018. This year, the league also cut a deal with CBS sports to televise 40 live primetime and weekend games. The league realizes at least $27 million a year in ticket revenue, with ticket sales this year again topping 1.5 million. That, by the way, is just about where the NBA was at its 23-year-mark. The WNBA also receives support, as a subsidiary partner, from the NBA. And there are other revenue streams such as concessions, merchandise, betting sites, etc. Exact numbers are difficult to come by in most cases because the leagues finances aren’t public. But even using the artificially low $52 million a year as a baseline revenue, the WNBA payroll is remarkably low by any objective business standard.
The economics don’t argue that the WNBA players should be paid on par with NBA players, but it does suggest that the players are undervalued by at least half, and probably more.