Sage Journals: Discover world-class research

Abstract

This paper tests for salary discrimination based on player ethnicities in Major League Soccer (MLS) with a market model. Particular focus is paid to Club Deportivo Chivas USA, which was operated by owners of a Mexican team that explicitly excludes non-Mexicans from their roster, Club Deportivo Guadalajara. Evidence of wage discrimination in MLS is found and the model is used to estimate how much of Chivas USA's poor performance was due to discrimination.

Keywords

discrimination soccer ethnicity market model ordered probit

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Baxter

(2016). MLS Math Doesn't Always Add Up. Los Angeles Times. Retrieved from http://www.latimes.com/sports/soccer/la-sp-soccer-baxter-20161029-story.html

Becker

(1957). The economics of discrimination. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Burdekin

R. C.

and Idson

T. L.

(1991). Customer preferences, attendance and the racial structure of professional basketball teams. Applied Economics 23(1), 179–186.

Celik

O. B.

and Ince-Yenilmez

(2017). Salary differences under the salary cap in Major League Soccer. International Journal of Sports Science & Coaching 12(5), 623–634.

Coates

, Frick

, and Jewell

(2016). Superstar salaries and soccer success: The impact of designated players in Major League Soccer. Journal of Sports Economics 17 (7), 716–735.

Duerr

G. M.

(2017). Civic integration or ethnic segregation? Models of ethnic and civic nationalism in club football/soccer. Soccer & Society 18 (2-3), 204–217.

Eisenmenger

(2010). McCabe Explains Generation Adidas. ussoccerplayers.com. [website] Retrieved from http://ussoccerplayers.com/2010/01/mccabe-explains-generation-adidas.html

Fallas

(2006). Goodbye 1836, hello Houston Dynamo. Houston Chronicle. Retrieved from http://www.chron.com/sports/dynamo/article/Goodbye-1836-hello-Houston-Dynamo-1634753.phpt

Forrest

and Simmons

(2000a). Focus on sport: Making up the results: The work of the football pools panel, 1963-1997. Journal of the Royal Statistical Society: Series D (The Statistician) 49 (2), 253–260.

10.

Forrest

and Simmons

(2000b). Forecasting sport: the behaviour and performance of football tipsters. International Journal of Forecasting 16 (3), 317–331.

11.

Francis

and Zheng

(2010). Learning vicariously from failure: The case of Major League Soccer and the collapse of the North American Soccer League. Group & Organization Management 35 (5), 542–571.

12.

Fraser v. Major League Soccer (2002). 284 f.3d 47 (1st cir. 2002).

13.

Goddard

and Asimakopoulos

(2004). Forecasting football results and the efficiency of fixed-odds betting. Journal of Forecasting 23 (1), 51–66.

14.

Goodfriend

(1992). Information-aggregation bias. The American Economic Review 82 (3), 508–519.

15.

Jewell

R. T.

(2015). The effect of marquee players on sports demand the case of us Major League Soccer. Journal of Sports Economics 18 (3), 239–252.

16.

Jewell

R. T.

and Molina

D. J.

(2005). An evaluation of the relationship between hispanics and Major League Soccer. Journal of Sports Economics 6 (2), 160–177.

17.

Kahane

L. H.

(2005). Production efficiency and discriminatory hiring practices in the National Hockey League: a stochastic frontier approach. Review of Industrial Organization 27 (1), 47–71.

18.

Kesenne

(2015). The single entity status of a sports league. Journal of Sports Economics 16 (8), 811–818.

19.

Koning

R. H.

(2000). Balance in competition in Dutch soccer. Journal of the Royal Statistical Society: Series D (The Statistician) 49 (3), 419–431.

20.

Kuethe

T. H.

and Motamed

(2010). Returns to stardom: evidence from us Major League Soccer. Journal of Sports Economics 11 (5), 567–579.

21.

Kuypers

(2000). Information and efficiency: An empirical study of a fixed odds betting market. Applied Economics 32 (11), 1353–1363.

22.

Lawson

R. A.

, Sheehan

, and Stephenson

E. F.

(2008). Vend it like Beckham: David Beckham's effect on MLS ticket sales. International Journal of Sport Finance 3 (4), 189.

23.

Mahoney

(2012). Chivas USA goes back to the past. Soccer America. [website] Retrieved from http://www.socceramerica.com/article/49646/chivas-usa-goes-back-to-the-past.html?print

24.

Martinez

(2005). Soccer vs. Futbol, Galaxy vs. Goats-L.A.‘s Ethnicity as Sport. Los Angeles Times. Retrieved from http://articles.latimes.com/2005/apr/20/opinion/oe-martinez20

25.

Mongeon

(2015). A market test for ethnic discrimination in the National Hockey League a game-level panel data approach. Journal of Sports Economics 16 (5), 460–481.

26.

Parker

(1999). Action in the Community. AdAge. [website]. Retrieved from adage.com/article/american-demographics/ac-tion-community/43442

27.

Pedace

(2008). Earnings, performance, and nationality discrimination in a highly com- petitive labor market as an analysis of the English professional soccer league. Journal of Sports Economics 9 (2), 115–140.

28.

Preston

and Szymanski

(2000). Racial discrimination in English football. Scottish Journal of Political Economy 47 (4), 342–363.

29.

Ramos

(2006). Kicking around Houston 1836: Soccer team sends the wrong message to Latinos. Houston Chronicle. Retrieved from http://www.chron.com/opinion/outlook/article/Kicking-around-Houston-1836-1884308.php

30.

Reilly

and Witt

(2007). The determinants of base pay and the role of race in Major League Soccer: Evidence from the 2007 league season. School of Economics Discussion Papers 1907, (pp. 1–27). University of Surrey.

31.

Rivera

(2017). Looking back at the Fire's last big signing in 2007, Cuauhtemoc Blanco. Chicago Fire Confidential. [website]. Retrieved from http://www.chicagonow.com/fre-confdential/2017/05/looking-back-at-the-fres-last-big-signing-in-2007-cuauhte-moc-blanco/

32.

Rogers

(2008). De La Hoya brings heavyweight class to Houston. Yahoo! Sports. Retrieved from https://www.yahoo.com/news/la-hoya-brings-heavyweight-class-035900227–mls.html

33.

Rosen

(1986). The theory of equalizing differences. In Ashenfelter

, and Layard

(Eds Handbook of labor economics Vol.1. (pp. 641–692). Amsterdam: Elsevier/North Holland.

34.

Szymanski

(2000). A market test for discrimination in the English professional soccer leagues. Journal of Political Economy 108 (3), 590–603.

35.

Twomey

and Monks

(2011). Monopsony and salary suppression: The case of Major League Soccer in the United States. The American Economist 56 (1), 20–28.

36.

Wilson

D. P.

and Ying

Y.-H.

(2003). Nationality preferences for labour in the international football industry. Applied Economics 35 (14), 1551–1559.

37.

Witz

(2014). Soccer A. Team Struggles to Remake Its Identity: Chivas U.S.A. Trying to Escape M.L.S. Doldrums. The New York Times. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/05/sports/soccer/chivas-usa-trying-to-escape-mls-doldrums.html?_r=

38.

Wooten

J. J.

(2013). Can ranking nationalities explain the salary discrepancies in Major League Soccer? (Doctoral dissertation). Washington State Universit. Retrieved from http://ses.wsu.edu/wpcontent/uploads/2014/09/WPVersion1.pdf.