The NFL’s Billion-Dollar Hypocrisy: How Cheerleaders Became the League’s Most Exploited Workers

A Shesight Investigation into Systemic Gender Discrimination

IMAGE DISCLAIMER: This article uses historical and contemporary photographs of NFL cheerleaders for journalistic documentation and critical analysis. These images illustrate the evolution of uniforms and working conditions discussed in our investigation. They are used respectfully to support our editorial critique of institutional practices, not to objectify or sexualize the highly trained dancers and performers pictured. We stand in solidarity with cheerleaders fighting for fair treatment, proper classification as employees, and equitable compensation.

The lights blaze, the crowd roars, the cameras pan across the field — and there they are, performing flawlessly in their signature uniforms. NFL cheerleaders have become as much a part of American football as the halftime show itself. But behind the sequins and synchronized routines lies an uncomfortable truth that the league would rather you didn’t notice: these women are among the most underpaid and exploited workers in professional sports.

At $150 per home game, the average NFL cheerleader earns less than $40 an hour for their on-field time — and that’s not counting the countless unpaid hours of rehearsals, mandatory appearances, and promotional work. Meanwhile, the NFL raked in $23 billion last year. The minimum salary for even a rookie NFL player? $840,000. The disparity isn’t just stark — it’s obscene.

But here’s what makes it worse: this isn’t an accident. It’s a feature, not a bug, of how the NFL has systematically commodified and devalued women’s labor for over half a century.

From Sweaters to Sex Appeal: The Deliberate Sexualization of Cheerleaders

When the Baltimore Colts introduced the NFL’s first cheerleading squad in 1954, the women wore modest, mid-thigh grazing skirts, thick sweaters, and minimal makeup. They looked like what they were: enthusiastic supporters of their team, dressed for a wholesome American pastime.

That all changed in the 1970s, and the shift was entirely deliberate.

In 1967, according to accounts documented in Mike Shropshire’s “The Ice Bowl,” Dallas Cowboys General Manager Tex Schramm witnessed a well-endowed stripper walk down stadium stairs carrying cotton candy, to thunderous cheers. Recognizing the profit potential, Schramm decided to recreate that dynamic — minus the cotton candy, but with all the sex appeal. By 1972, the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders debuted their now-iconic uniform: cropped tops that barely grazed the bust, tiny shorts, and white go-go boots. The outfit was so revealing that it eventually landed in the Smithsonian — not as a cautionary tale, but as an American cultural artifact.

The transformation was immediate and league-wide. What had been a pep squad became a spectacle designed to titillate male fans. Teams abandoned pleated skirts and sweaters for barely-there tops, strategic slits, and uniforms that prioritized “glamour and sex appeal” over athleticism. The message was clear: these women weren’t there to showcase their considerable dance and gymnastics talents. They were there to be looked at.

And here’s the twisted logic that’s sustained this system for decades: because the role was reframed as “glamorous” and “prestigious,” teams convinced women they should feel lucky to do it — regardless of compensation.

The Price of “Prestige”: Wage Theft Disguised as Opportunity

Let’s be brutally honest about what NFL cheerleading has become: institutionalized exploitation wrapped in sparkle.

Before a wave of lawsuits beginning in 2014, some cheerleaders were paid as little as $2.85 per hour — well below minimum wage. The Oakland Raiderettes earned just $125 per game. The Buffalo Bills’ cheerleaders? They weren’t paid at all. These women were charged audition fees, forced to buy their own uniforms and beauty treatments, and compelled to purchase stacks of team calendars featuring their own images (for which they received no compensation) to resell in a pyramid-scheme-style arrangement.

Former San Francisco 49ers cheerleader “Jane Doe” worked in a pizza parlor to pay rent while performing for one of the wealthiest sports franchises in America. Former Oakland Raiderette Lacy Thibodeaux Fields discovered her contract contained so many illegal provisions that her attorney — a veteran labor rights lawyer — said she’d never seen anything like it in her entire career.

When these women finally fought back, filing federal lawsuits against teams including the Raiders, Bills, Bengals, Jets, and Buccaneers, the settlements told the story of systemic wage theft. The Raiders settled for $1.25 million. The Buccaneers paid $825,000. Fields herself received just $2,300 for a season of underpaid work — and an additional $10,000 for being the lead plaintiff who risked everything.

And what changed after these landmark cases? Not nearly enough. A 2024 report found that cheerleaders still earn around $150 per game — barely more than before the lawsuits, and a figure that translates to roughly $22,500 annually for seasonal work.

Double Standards: The Gender Discrimination Hiding in Plain Sight

The wage disparity is only part of the story. NFL cheerleaders face a level of behavioral control and scrutiny that would be unthinkable for any male employee.

In 2018, New Orleans Saints cheerleader Bailey Davis was fired for posting a photo of herself in a lacy bodysuit on her private Instagram account. Meanwhile, Saints players posted whatever they wanted, with zero consequences. Another former cheerleader, Kristan Ware, was told she couldn’t mention God or discuss her faith — while male players openly prayed on the 50-yard line and professed their beliefs on social media “with complete freedom.”

Cheerleaders are given rulebooks governing everything from the color of their nail polish to their social media presence to their personal lives. In her Equal Employment Opportunity Commission complaint, Davis revealed that Saints cheerleaders were required to avoid eye contact with players, leave restaurants if players entered, and maintain different standards of personal conduct — all under the guise of “protecting” them from “player advances.”

This isn’t protection. It’s control. It’s treating adult professional women like children who need to be managed and monitored — while the men on the field face no such restrictions.

As one lawsuit noted, cheerleaders were subjected to pay deductions for infractions like wearing the wrong shade of nail polish or bringing incorrect pom-poms to practice. They had virtually no autonomy, no power in their workplace, and no recourse when mistreated.

Why This Matters: It’s Not Just About Cheerleaders

The NFL cheerleader problem is a microcosm of how society devalues women’s work — particularly when that work involves femininity, beauty, or performance.

Documentary filmmaker Yu Gu, who chronicled the cheerleaders’ fight in “A Woman’s Work: The NFL’s Cheerleader Problem,” put it plainly: “There is something in the inherent, rigid femininity of cheerleading that makes us less likely to take seriously the struggles those in the industry face. Instead, we deride cheerleaders for embracing a type of femininity that many women have been encouraged to adhere to their whole lives.”

These are elite athletes with decades of training in dance and gymnastics. They’re performers who execute precision routines for audiences of 60,000 live spectators and millions on television. But because their work is feminine, because it involves appearance, because it’s been deliberately sexualized, it’s treated as less valuable — as something women should do for exposure rather than fair compensation.

And let’s address the elephant in the stadium: nearly all cheerleaders are women performing for an industry owned and controlled almost entirely by men. Billionaire owners who collectively earn $23 billion annually have decided that paying these women fairly would somehow be unreasonable — even though tripling or quadrupling cheerleader salaries would have a negligible impact on team finances.

This isn’t about money. It’s about power. It’s about who gets to decide what women’s labor is worth.

The Solution Is Obvious. The Question Is Whether the NFL Has the Decency to Implement It.

The fix is startlingly simple: pay them fairly, or eliminate the role entirely.

If NFL teams genuinely can’t afford to compensate cheerleaders at a living wage, then perhaps they shouldn’t have cheerleaders at all. But we know that’s not the issue. Teams could easily pay cheerleaders $50,000, $75,000, even $100,000 per season and barely feel it in their budgets. Even mascots often earn $65,000 annually — and they’re performing in foam costumes, not risking serious physical injury in barely-there uniforms.

The refusal to pay fairly isn’t about economics. It’s about values. It’s a statement about what the league thinks these women — and by extension, all women — are worth.

And it’s not just morally bankrupt. It’s a terrible look for a league that’s constantly trying to court female fans, that runs pink-ribbon campaigns for breast cancer awareness, and that loves to drape itself in social consciousness when convenient.

At a time when every major corporation is being held accountable for equity, transparency, and fair treatment of workers, the NFL’s continued exploitation of cheerleaders is an embarrassment. If team owners can’t summon actual empathy, they should at least pretend — because the optics are getting worse by the year.

Recent trends show some teams moving toward more athletic, less revealing uniforms, and some squads have become co-ed entertainment teams rather than all-female cheering squads. But these cosmetic changes don’t address the fundamental problem: systemic undervaluation and exploitation of predominantly female labor.

The Real Spectacle

On any given Sunday, tens of millions of Americans tune in to watch football. The cheerleaders bring energy, artistry, and visual spectacle to the experience. They train for years. They risk injury. They represent their teams with professionalism and grace.

And they’re paid less than parking attendants.

The contrast between their talent and the league’s indifference is the real spectacle here — and it’s far from entertaining. It’s a reminder that even in 2025, even in industries worth tens of billions of dollars, women’s work can still be dismissed, diminished, and disgracefully underpaid.

As Lacy Fields said in the closing moments of “A Woman’s Work”: “A woman’s work is never-ending. Women work hard in the home, outside the home, and they’re constantly having to say it and prove it and show it for it to be acknowledged.”

The NFL cheerleaders have said it. They’ve proved it. They’ve shown it.

The only question now is whether the league is capable of acknowledging it — or whether it will continue profiting from their labor while paying them poverty wages, secure in the knowledge that another generation of young women will line up for the “prestige” of being exploited in sequins.

Because right now, that’s exactly what’s happening. And that makes every one of us watching complicit in the devaluation of these women’s worth.

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