Women are more visible today in the world of sport than they ever have been, but has the pay gap caught up yet? The figures would suggest not.
Women are more visible today in the world of sport than they ever have been before, but has the pay gap caught up yet? The figures would suggest not.
Money talks, we all know that, and in golf, the recent hyped-up, head-to-head winner-takes-all match between Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson demonstrated this.
These are two players edging towards the back end of their career, yet they still had the ability to command £7 million for one match. It is so disappointing that our sport was sold in this way, simply making rich men richer when surely such a significant sum of money could have been used to do something worthwhile for golf.
To put this obscene amount of money into perspective, in 2017 the highest-earning female player on the LPGA Tour, Sung Hyun Park, made four-times less than that, while the total prize fund on the Ladies European Tour this year is just under $14.5million.
Ladies European Tour player Meghan MacLaren took to Twitter recently in a rant that gained plenty of attention:
MacLaren is fresh off the LET seasoner-opener, the Fatima Bint Mubarak Ladies Open in Abu Dhabi, which had a purse of $293,000. One week later and just down the road, the men's European Tour event, the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship has a purse of $7,000,000 – that’s a difference of more than $6.7m.
That took place at Saadiyat Beach Golf Club, not too far away from Abu Dhabi Golf Club where this week’s Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship is being held.
In fact, Golf Travel Centre recently conducted a study into the disparities in pay between male and female professional golfers and the pay gap has steadily got worse over the past few years. In 2018, there was an 82% difference in average earnings per stroke of the top 10 men vs the top 10 women - a 7% increase since 2017.
Here's what that gap looks like in real terms:
- Women have only taken home 25% of the total £45.9 million prize money from major tournaments in 2018
- Across the four Majors this year, the men in first place earned an average of £5,684 per shot while the women only earned £1,662
- It would have taken Ariya Jutanugarn, winner of the U.S Women’s Open, 26 strokes to buy a Mercedes GLE (£65k) while Brooks Koepka, winner of the Men’s U.S Open, would have done it in just 11
- Georgia Hall could have bought 1,239 Ping G400 Max Drivers with her British Open winnings while Francesco Molinari, winner of the men’s equivalent, could have bought over double that
For more information on these statistics visit: https://www.golftravelcentre.com
And it's not just a statistic that we see in golf - it's prevalent across the entire world of sport. Not a single female featured in the 2018 Forbes list of the 100 highest-paid athletes in the world, and a report from PayScale earlier this year revealed that even female sports marketing managers get paid significantly less than their male counterparts.
Yes, women are more visible in sport today than they ever have been, but has the pay gap caught up yet? The figures would suggest not.
There are plenty of women who have a very successful career in golf, playing or otherwise, but as we desperately look into new ways to attract more females to the game, should we be looking closer at balancing the earning potential for both genders in the industry, instead of worrying about how to update the dress code in the clubhouse?
In May this year, the R&A announced their commitment to the women’s game with an £80 million investment over the next 10 years. Part of this investment includes the new Women in Golf Charter that aims to increase the number of women playing and working in golf. Generating more interest in the women’s game at the bottom rung will have a positive knock-on effect through to the top, but let’s consider the remaining investment which has given us the best opportunity yet to push female golf to new heights.
If we had more events in the UK that embrace professional female golfers, it would make it easier to establish a greater fan base that includes men, women and children. Also, more mixed events, or competing at the same venue and at the same time as the men. Ladies might not receive the same prize fund, but at least they’d be competing on an equal playing field.
How can we drive women’s golf to a new level and begin to close the substantial pay gap? Tell us what you think by emailing [email protected]
