Mexico fines soccer teams for conspiring to limit female players’ salaries

Mexico’s antitrust commission is fining 17 soccer clubs and the Mexican Football Federation a total of roughly $9 million for conspiring to limit female players’ salaries. 

Reuters reported on Thursday that Mexico’s Federal Economic Competition Commission, or COFECE, as it is known in the local language, says after the women’s leagues were formed in 2016, soccer clubs worked together to create wage caps for players. 

“The practice … not only had a negative impact on their income, but also had the consequence of widening the gender pay gap,” COFECE said in a statement, according to Reuters.

COFECE claimed that female players under the age of 17 were provided educational and food assistance but were not paid. Adult female soccer players had a monthly cap on wages of between $25 and $100, which later rose to $750, Reuters reported. 

Some of Mexico’s top soccer teams were named in the commission’s accusation, according to The Associated Press.

The fines were not being fought by either the clubs or the federation, league Liga MX and the federation said together in a statement, adding that wage ceilings ended in May 2019, according to Reuters.

Players’ ability to earn a higher wage or move to different teams had also been impeded through a different arrangement, the AP reported. Dubbed a “gentlemen’s agreement” between the federation and the collection of soccer clubs that were fined, clubs could still keep on a player whose contract had expired, according to Reuters. 

An athlete’s current team would have to give its blessing, and would possibly ask for payment, before their player was allowed to leave. Liga MX and the federation claimed that agreement ended in 2018.