TLDR: WNBA players demand fair pay, sparking the “Pay Us What You Owe Us” movement during tense collective bargaining negotiations.
WNBA all-star players, led by Indiana Fever’s Caitlin Clark and the Minnesota Lynx’s Naphessa Collier, recently made headlines by wearing “Pay Us What You Owe Us” T-shirts during the pregame warm-up.
The T-shirts, which are now available for purchase, were a demonstration of players’ frustrations with the WNBA owners and the ongoing collective bargaining agreement negotiation. The collective agreement sets out the terms and conditions of employment (like salaries and benefits) between the league and its players, and is set to expire Oct. 31, 2025.
Reportedly, players are asking for increased revenue sharing (the current agreement stipulates WNBA players receive only nine per cent of league revenue, relative to their NBA peers who receive 50 per cent), increased compensation (the average WNBA salary is US$147,745) and other benefits.
Central to these demands is the perception that, despite a surge in popularity, media attention and viewership, WNBA players are still being underpaid and are undervalued.
Negotiations for a new collective agreement are ongoing. But as the T-shirts and subsequent public statements from the players and the WNBA show, there is increasing frustration with how the process is unfolding.
What is ‘owed’ to WNBA players?
Debate over what is “owed” to WNBA players has intensified recently. ESPN commentator Pat McAfee, for example, has suggested the league should simply increase players’ salaries by US$30,000 per player, saying that contracts like Clark’s are “an embarrassment.”
But others argue this discussion should go beyond players’ salaries. Syracuse University sport management professor Lindsey Darvin writes:
“The question isn’t whether the WNBA can afford to pay players what they’re worth; it’s whether the league can afford not to make the investments necessary to realize its full potential.”
According to Darvin, because the WNBA is an economically inefficient — and arguably exploitative — business, its focus should be on increasing revenue, and not simply on reducing its labour costs. For example, with the goal to satisfy increasing market demands for the WNBA, strategies to increase revenue could include expanding the league to new markets, scheduling more games at the 3 p.m. Eastern time slot and increasing the number of regular season games from 44 to 60 or more.
In sport management classrooms and negotiation workshops at Brock University, we call this “expanding the pie” — working collaboratively, as opposed to combatively, to grow the game and the business so that both players and owners benefit over the long term. But this is easier said than done.
Information shapes negotiation outcomes
While it’s still early in the negotiation process, there are lessons that can be learned from this round of collective bargaining. One of those lessons has to do with making and receiving first offers. In particular, two psychological concepts are at play: information asymmetry and the anchoring effect.
Information asymmetry occurs when one party holds more relevant knowledge than the other. For example, in a typical job negotiation, the employer knows the number of applicants for the position, how much the company is willing to pay and what compensation trends look like across the sector. The candidate, by contrast, lacks most if not all of this information and thus enters the negotiation at a distinct disadvantage.
The question is: who should make the first salary offer? The general rule is that when you lack critical information, it’s better to let the other side make the first move.
In the case of the WNBA’s negotiations, the information asymmetry problem is not so obvious. The owners likely have a certain perspective on what is acceptable in terms of sharing league revenue and improving working conditions. But the players possess their own kind of leverage, regarding their willingness to protest or walk out entirely.
The league made its initial proposal to the players in early July, but it was not well received.
The ‘anchoring effect’ can skew negotiations
Another problem influencing negotiations is the “anchoring effect.” This occurs when an initial offer influences subsequent offers and counteroffers, and ultimately has an impact on the final outcome.
Garage-sale aficionados may recognize this tendency, as buyers often negotiate with the seller’s sticker price in mind, haggling to earn a 25 or 50 per cent discount on an item without considering whether the item is actually worth the cost. Here, the sticker acts as the anchor.
While sticker prices and first offers are not inherently malicious, some sale prices and first offers are intended to manipulate buyers and negotiators representing the other side. Savvy negotiators deploy strategic anchors, but even they can sometimes miss.
In maritime terms, anchor scour occurs when a ship’s anchor fails to catch hold and instead drags across the seabed, destroying ecosystems caught in its path.
In negotiations, a similar process can unfold. When initial moves and first offers fail to catch hold because they are perceived to be unfair by the other side, it can damage relationships and can make subsequent negotiations even more difficult.
Now, the WNBA may face the consequences of a poorly received anchor. According to WNBA player representative, Satou Sabally, the WNBA’s initial offer was a “slap in the face”.
New York Liberty’s Breanna Stewart called the players’ meeting with the league on July 17 to discuss a new collective bargaining agreement a “wasted opportunity” while Chicago Sky player Angel Reese called the negotiations “disrespectful.”
It’s time to right the ship
Though it’s still early days, we expect negotiations to heat up in the coming weeks as the Halloween deadline to reach a deal approaches.
There is still time to right the ship, so to speak, but to do so, WNBA players and owners must internalize the potentially disastrous impacts that can come from negotiating over an imagined “fixed pie” instead of expanding it, and dropping anchors that fail to address the other sides’ key interests.
WNBA players and WNBA team owners now have, in front of them, a once-in-a-generation opportunity to transform professional women’s sport in North America, through creatively and collaboratively expanding the pie and paying the players what they’re owed.
Written by Ryan Clutterbuck, Assistant Professor in Sport Management, Brock University; Michael Van Bussel, Assistant Professor in Sport Management, Brock University, and Michele K. Donnelly, Assistant Professor, Department of Sport Management, Brock University
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
