A Vox reader asks: Why do people pay more to watch men\u2019s sports than women\u2019s sports?<\/p>\n
For all of Caitlin Clark<\/a>\u2019s feats on the basketball court \u2014 breaking all-time scoring records, taking the Iowa Hawkeyes to two national championships and getting the Indiana Fever to the WNBA playoffs \u2014 what might be more impressive is the attention she\u2019s captured and the sheer amount of people who want to see her play and are willing to pay top dollar to watch her dish dazzling assists and launch 3-point daggers from the logo.<\/p>\n In her rookie season, Clark helped the Fever achieve the best attendance in the league \u2014 over 17,000 people per game<\/a>, a 265 percent increase<\/a> over last season \u2014 and their televised games regularly reached over 1 million viewers<\/a> per contest. Scalpers were selling tickets outside the arena. At one point in the season, they were asking $250 for a ticket<\/a> that usually went for under $100, while some secondary market sellers were looking for up to $9,000, CNN reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n Clark\u2019s emergence alongside a new generation of exciting rookies<\/a> and ultra-talented, already-established veterans<\/a> has created momentum for women\u2019s basketball and more generally women\u2019s sports. Mainly: People are finally willing to pay more to see women\u2019s basketball? That raises the question: Why weren\u2019t they already?<\/p>\n Why have women\u2019s sports historically been less popular?<\/p>\n At the heart of this question is a pretty simple answer: Men have had decades-long head starts when it comes to sports and professional sporting leagues. To put it in perspective, women were allowed to compete in the 1900 Olympics in five sports<\/a>; it wasn\u2019t until the 2012 London Olympics that women competed in all of the sports that the men were.<\/p>\n Similarly, in the US, experts specifically point to Title IX<\/a> \u2014 the federal law that bans gender discrimination at schools receiving federal aid \u2014 and its passing in 1972 as a watershed moment for gender equality in sports. Before that, US schools had no obligation to provide the same athletic opportunities to girls that they did for boys. It broke down existing barriers to entry, allowing women not only to compete but also receive equal financial opportunity tied to sports (e.g., college scholarships ). But when Title IX solidified women\u2019s rights into law and protected them from discrimination, the NBA was already over 20 years old.<\/p>\n \u201cThe easy way to think about it is to look at the overall lack of investment,\u201d Lindsey Darvin, an assistant professor at Syracuse University<\/a>, told me. Darvin studies women\u2019s sports and gender equity in the intercollegiate and professional sports industry. She said that the NBA, and any other major sports league, have had decades upon decades of resources, both external and internal, infused into them. Women\u2019s leagues are, relatively speaking, still so young and don\u2019t (yet) gather the same kind of attention.<\/p>\n \u201cThe amount of investment that\u2019s been put into the NBA \u2014 it dwarfs what\u2019s been put into the WNBA,\u201d Darvin said. The WNBA was founded in 1996, almost 30 years ago. The same number of years on the NBA timeline would be the late \u201970s, when the league was finally established and on the verge of a massive leap in popularity. While the WNBA is growing, it hasn\u2019t seen the same kind of trajectory \u2014 at least not yet.<\/p>\n It took decades for teams like the Lakers, Yankees, Arsenal, Bruins, and Packers to become lucrative sports franchises that generate millions<\/a> in revenue<\/a> each year and play in arenas and stadiums in front of thousands of people. Some professional leagues<\/a> count revenue in the tens of billions of dollars. Decades of investment \u2014 money, advertising, promotion, television deals, sponsorships, etc., \u2014 have turned teams and leagues into brand names.<\/p>\n That\u2019s what you\u2019re paying for when you\u2019re purchasing a ticket. That\u2019s also why a men\u2019s pro sports ticket is usually going to be more expensive than a women\u2019s.<\/p>\n How does marketing factor into it?<\/p>\n The last couple of years in women\u2019s college basketball have shown us that women\u2019s sports can challenge men\u2019s in popularity \u2014 like, right now. At the 2024 Final Four, tickets for the women\u2019s tickets on the secondary market were going double<\/a> for the price of the men\u2019s games.<\/p>\n The Caitlin Clark effect was in full motion, and the ratings for Clark and her cohort were at an all-time high. Clark\u2019s last two games were the most-watched in history, averaging close to 14 million and, as The Athletic reported, eclipsed men\u2019s sporting events<\/a> like every World Series since 2019, every NBA Finals game since 2017, and every Daytona 500 since 2006.<\/p>\n \u201cAs a researcher, I don\u2019t like to say the phrase that \u2018the stars align\u2019 because that just seems so kind of out there \u2014 but the stars aligning is a piece of it, and that\u2019s what happened, right?\u201d Darvin said, noting that Clark\u2019s skill and flashy, appealing game; the success of the Iowa basketball team; and Clark\u2019s marketability and her team\u2019s underdog story were all factors in becoming a phenomenon.<\/p>\n But what intrigues Darvin is now that Clark has graduated and driven similar sellouts in the WNBA, is whether this can convince people \u2014 especially those in charge \u2014 that people are willing to spend more money to see women\u2019s sports.<\/p>\n One of the trickier reasons about why men\u2019s sports are valued over women\u2019s is because that\u2019s what we\u2019ve been told they were more important for so long. Clark and Iowa basketball are one of the rare examples when investment, promotion, and media hammered home that Clark\u2019s games were worth watching, worth paying for, and even more exciting than the men\u2019s teams.<\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019re steered in directions through marketing, advertisements, and the media \u2014 you are basically told what you\u2019re supposed to like and what you should pay for, and what you\u2019re going to enjoy,\u201d Darvin said. \u201cAnd what is cool to enjoy and pay for has always been men\u2019s sports.\u201d<\/p>\n Essentially, we were told to value Caitlin Clark\u2019s senior season in a way that hadn\u2019t happened in women\u2019s college basketball. But while Clark is the most recent barrier-breaker, she isn\u2019t alone.<\/p>\n During her career, Serena Williams<\/a> and her rivals<\/a> were at times bigger stories than male tennis players. (Not unrelated: Tennis has been one of the better sports at striving for equal pay.) Simone Biles<\/a> and the US women\u2019s gymnastics team are bigger stories than the American men, and similarly, women\u2019s figure skating is usually as popular as men\u2019s at the Olympics. Those are all examples, Darvin said, where women athletes fare better when it comes to marketing and publicity.<\/p>\n The more women\u2019s pro sports are publicized and marketed, the more people are willing to pay to see pro women athletes, and ostensibly the idea is that all this capital turns into growth, opportunity, and equality for women. With more money, perhaps the WNBA will be able to pay rookies more than $76,000 for their first season<\/a>! A possible sign of progress: Unrivaled, a stateside professional 3×3 women\u2019s league debuted in January with a $200,000 average salary<\/a> per player and a multiyear media deal with TNT<\/a>. Darvin also notes that college women athletes signing lucrative NIL deals<\/a> are also changing the playing field and upping their media profiles.<\/p>\n If there\u2019s one drawback it\u2019s that if all goes according to plan, eventually we\u2019ll get to the point (in the distant future) where women\u2019s pro sports won\u2019t be as accessible. Currently one of the debates around the NBA is that the ratings are down<\/a> and whether that\u2019s due to it being very expensive<\/a> to watch or even attend a game. One of the best things about women\u2019s pro sports and women\u2019s basketball is that it\u2019s affordable.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Vox reader asks: Why do people pay more to watch men\u2019s sports than women\u2019s sports? 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