The Patriot Post® · U.S. Women Win Whiner's World Cup

What’s worse than a whiny loser? A whiny winner. In a nutshell, the U.S. women’s soccer team had an incredible run to win its fourth Women’s World Cup. The American women turned in a dominant performance that, under normal circumstances, should make our nation proud. But instead of uniting the country behind the national team, the entire story has been the team’s griping, complaining, and general anti-Americanism. What a shame.

American midfielder Megan Rapinoe made clear her disdain for American President Donald Trump. Fine, an athlete doesn’t like Trump. What else is new? But she went out of her way to refuse a White House invite before it had even been given — indeed, before the team had even won. How self-righteous and presumptuous. After the victory, she said she’d be “very happy to accept” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer’s invite.

Then there was midfielder Allie Long, who dropped the American flag on the ground during her choreographed victory celebration with Rapinoe. Teammate Kelley O'Hara picked up the flag, but the disrespect had been shown.

And finally there was the championship celebration marred by tiresome chants of “equal pay!” According to The New York Times, “In recent years, that fight for pay equality has been the women’s team’s calling card. The players contend they are paid less by the United States Soccer Federation than the men — sometimes tens of thousands of dollars or more for top players in a given year — and that the situation has persisted for years even as the women’s team has collected more trophies and begun to produce more revenue than the men.” Never mind that six of the 12 top-paid U.S. players are women. The women’s team sued U.S. soccer for gender discrimination earlier this year.

It’s true that the U.S. men’s soccer team has never been as successful as the women. The men didn’t even make the World Cup in 2018. It’s also true that the women don’t bring home as much money as the men. But the women’s pie is a whole lot smaller.

Matt Walsh explains, “FIFA, the international soccer organization, will give about $400 million to male players in the World Cup, while female players will make around $30 million.” That sounds bad, but not when revenue is factored in. The Women’s World Cup earned in the neighborhood of $130 million. That’s great, but the 2018 Men’s World Cup brought in more than $6 billion. So the women’s slice of the pie (23% of revenue) is far larger than the men’s (7%), relative to the whole. But Rapinoe wants that $30 million for the women to be quadrupled to $120 million. How about quadrupling revenue first?

Why so much more money for the men? More viewers. Rich Lowry notes, “The women’s tournament this year may have had about a billion viewers across all platforms, nothing to sneeze at. But the 2018 men’s World Cup had more than a billion viewers just for the final game.”

We’re not making any judgment to assert the simple fact that not nearly as many people watch the women as watch the men. That translates to more money for the men. It’s not misogyny or some travesty of “social justice”; it’s simply the market at work.