Both sides have reached a deal to reconcile unequal working conditions that the USWNTA has filed as part of a larger lawsuit since March 2019, claiming that women were paid less than the men’s team and were also given unequal terms.
Subsequent claim, U.S. Soccer announced on Tuesday, which has been resolved, in which both parties have submitted a proposed settlement. In it, the federation promises to implement policies specifically related to “hotel facilities, staff, destinations and travel”.
Levinson said the deal “does not take into account the central fact in this case that female players are paid at a lower rate than men doing the same job.”
That said, we are as committed to our work as ever to receiving legally qualified equal pay. “Our focus is on the future and we make sure that we leave a better place for this sport and the next generation of women who will play for this team and this country.”
Cindy Parlo Cone, president of US Soccer and former USWNT player, called Tuesday’s deal a “positive step” and urged the team to accept a standing offer to discuss contract options.
“As a former USWNT player, I can promise you that I am committed to equality between USWNT and USMNT,” he said in a statement referring to the men’s national team. “My goal is and always has been, to come to a resolution on all matters of equal pay and inspire a new era of collaboration, partnership and trust between the USWNT and the Federation.”
US Soccer President: Equal pay demands will bankrupt the organization
In a conference call following the announcement, Cone told reporters that the federation has reached out to the team and offered the same contract as the men for games controlled by US soccer. However, Cone said the team was urging the federation to raise the amount of the FIFA World Cup prize, with “the vast majority of the $ 5 million they are requesting back.”
Making that money, Cone said, would make US soccer bankrupt.
“This would be disastrous for our budget and our programming,” he said. “But given to Covid it wouldn’t be too dramatic, but it would probably bankrupt the federation.”
In May, the U.S.W.N.T. The court rejected the team’s claim of equal pay after star Megan Rapino appeared on ABC’s “Good Morning America,” saying the U.S. Soccer has never offered women men’s contracts.
USWNT’s equal pay claims were previously dismissed by a judge.
The USWNT originally filed a lawsuit against the US Soccer Federation in March 2019, with 28 members of the team listed as plaintiffs.
Claim U.S. The Soccer Federation’s payment practices are accused of “paying less than men for equal work and denying them at least equal playing, training and travel conditions; equal promotion of their games; equal support and development. Their games; and other conditions and Terms of employment are the same as for MNT. “
“This approach – just comparing what each team would have made under the other team’s CBA – is incapable in this case because it ignores the reality of the deals made by MNT and WNT for different agreements, and the WNT explicitly rejects them,” Klausner wrote. That is the conditions they now want to impose on themselves in the previous way.
Ripino defended the USWNT, arguing that “the men’s contract was never offered to us and certainly did not pay as much.”
“To say that we negotiated our contract and that’s what we agreed to, I think a lot of women can understand what it’s like to go into negotiations knowing this spirit of equal pay, it’s not on the table. Nowhere near your male counterparts. Don’t even know. But at the table, “she said.
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