Should female athletes get paid as much as male athletes

First, my opponent did not source any of their arguments about anatomical differences, so therefore these arguments are null. Second, their argument about personally admiring female athletes is no more than an unsubstantiated opinion used in an effort to appeal to pathos. Rebuttals “If women are working just as many hours and putting forth the same amount of effort as men, they deserve to be paid just as much.” Female athletes may put in the same number of hours, but they put-out subpar performances. For example, Let’s say Melinda and Billy both work 60 hours a week at an investment banking company. Melinda closes 10 deals worth $10 million total, and Billy closes 8 deals worth $8 million total. By your logic Jimmy and Melinda deserve to be paid the same amount of money because they work the same number of hours. So your argument for equal hours of training for equal pay does not hold water. “If the fastest woman in the world can run the 100m dash in 10.59 seconds, then obviously that is their max. Women have yet to beat this record, so it's evident that no matter how much they train, women can't increase their speed much more due to their body anatomy. It isn't a controlled issue. Therefore, their pay should not be based on such a factor.” Let’s say Jessica and Bob both study calculus for 10 hours a week. Jessica was born extremely smart and Bob was born moderately intelligent. By your logic, they should both be awarded the same grade on all of their calculus tests because Bob was not born as smart as Jessica. So you argument does not hold any clout because even though Jessica and Bob were born with different body anatomies, they will, and should receive different grades (School equivalent of Pay) In addition, different men are born with different biological advantages. So should the Man who runs a 3:50 mile as his “max” be paid the same as a man who runs a 4:00 mile as his “max”, the answer is no because athletes are paid based on performance. Pro also said that testosterone is an unfair advantage in sports. Nevertheless, why is testosterone an unfair advantage, this is like saying that having a photographic memory is an unfair advantage in school. Should athletes not be allowed to use the talents they were born with? No, they should use their talents to the fullest and they will be paid based on performance, whether or not the women can “keep up”. “To compare men to women in sports is like comparing a woman police officer to a male one. The women are putting in just as many hours as the men, but the men are called to more cases because they're stronger. Therefore, they should be paid more than the women? I don't think so. Women work just as hard as men.” If the men are called to more cases than the women are, then they deserve to be paid more. Even though both worked the same number of hours, the men put in higher quality work than the women by working more cases. If the women were incapable of doing those cases, then they should not be paid for work they did not do. I agree with equal pay for equal work, but female athletes do subpar work as compared to men and therefore do not deserve equal pay! “If that's the best they can do, then great! Cheers to Florence Griffith Joyner who ran that 100m dash in 10.59 seconds.” This argument does not hold up in the performance-based world of pro sports. If you can’t keep up, then you get left behind in pay. Flo-Jo would be more than a second behind Usain Bolt, but you argue that they should get equal pay? Bolt should be paid more because he does better quality work and faster times in track and field are more marketable. “It's discrimination. The amount of people in the stands at men vs women games is irrelevant. Last time I checked, athletes don't get paid for their moms and friends coming out to watch them play.” This argument (aside from many RationalMadman arguments) is possibly the worst argument I have ever seen on DDO. Athletes get paid based on how many people they can bring into stadiums and how many people that will watch them on TV. WNBA games averaged just 413,000 viewers, compared to 1.46 million viewers for NBA games (http://outsports.com...). This means the men’s better performances attract more viewers, which means more advertising money. In addition, for your discrimination point, it would be discrimination against men to have equal pay in this case. Would it not seem wrong to say to LeBron James that he would be receiving the same pay as Candace Parker even though he brought in more than triple the viewership and has several times the fan base size as Parker? In addition, if women want to win the same amount of prize money that men make, they can compete against men for that prize money. Since women really cannot compete against men and play at a much lower level of competition, they get a lower amount of prize money. That is what fair actually is. Women should not be accommodated because they can’t perform as well as men, that would be the definition of discrimination. So, I have shown why female athletes do not deserve equal pay, and Pro has simply tried to win on the basis of pathos and un-sourced statistics.