Opinion | American Soccer: Where Men Are Men, and Women Are Repeat World Cup Champions

Twenty-eight national team players sued the United States Soccer Federation in March, claiming it pays them less, provides unequal playing conditions and does not promote their games as much as it does those of the men’s team. If both teams played and won the same number of “friendly” matches in a year, according to the lawsuit, the women would earn, at most, $99,000. The men, $263,320 on average.

As the score hovered at a draw in the World Cup final last Sunday, I couldn’t forget that if the American women didn’t win, it would probably undercut the discussion around their push for equal pay. Even though that would make them second in the world, and after they won the last tournament in 2015. (The last time the American men won a medal in the World Cup it was 1930.) To get what they deserve, the women need to be perfect.

Maybe that’s part of why the team ran up scores like 13-0 during this World Cup; they need a narrative of dominance in order to make their case to get paid the same as men who aren’t even on the same level.

And they won while having every quote, every celebratory gesture scrutinized by the public and the president alike. Americans who didn’t like how Alex Morgan sipped tea or how Megan Rapinoe refused to sing the national anthem even rooted for them to lose.

Of course, there are reasons the men’s team makes more money; there always are. But one of the more intractable excuses is that the world thinks of men’s sports, like many men’s ventures, as profitable businesses worth investing in. Women’s sports are relegated to inspiration. Why else would the United States women’s team, composed of working adults, have the unfathomably patronizing slogan “Dare to Shine”?

Money makes money — women can play and win all they want. (Provided we are grateful for the opportunity.) But the system is created by men, for men. We pay for what we value. And if we invest in women’s soccer as though there won’t be an audience, we’ll make that come true.

Today, 40 percent of all athletes are female — inspired by role models like Brandi Chastain, as this team was. But they receive only 4 percent of media coverage.