2, 4, 6, 8 NFL Cheerleaders Not 'Rah Rah-ing' About Pay Rate

Two NFL teams are facing wage and hour class action lawsuits filed by their cheerleaders. On January 22, an Oakland Raiderette sued the Raiders organization on behalf of herself and current and former cheerleaders alleging that the Raiders violated a slew of California labor laws. And last week, a member of the Cincinnati Bengals cheerleading team, the "Ben-Gals," sued the Bengals organization alleging class-wide wage and hour violations. NFL franchises (and other sports teams) must take notice.

The Raiders pay the Raiderettes $125 a game, which equates to $1,250 for the 10-home game season. The lawsuit alleges that when you include hours spent practicing, at non-game events, photo shoots, and additional hours working on game days before and after the game, Oakland pays them only about $5.00 per hour, well below California's minimum wage, and fails to pay them overtime for any day they work over 8 hours. The Raiders also do not pay the cheerleaders until the end of the NFL season. According to the Raiderettes' contract, the Raiders require the cheerleaders to attend a minimum of 10 charity appearances without any pay and they do not receive any portion of the revenues from promotional merchandise featuring the Raiderettes. The Raiders also require them to pay for their own hair and makeup for games, events and photo shoots, and the team docks pay for, among other things, forgetting to bring the correct pom-poms to practice. Based on these pay practices, the plaintiff Raiderette alleges violations for failing to pay them at the minimum wage and overtime, failing to provide meal breaks, withholding wages for months and forcing them to pay certain expenses.

The allegations in the Ben-Gals lawsuit are similar. The plaintiff Ben-Gal alleges that the Bengals paid her a total of $855 for 300 hours spent performing, practicing and attending events resulting in a hourly rate of just $2.85 per hour. She also alleges that the Bengals required her and other...