Name, Image, and Inequality: Gendered Outcomes in College Athlete NIL Markets

The implementation of Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) rights has fundamentally transformed collegiate athletics by allowing student-athletes to monetize their personal brands. While these policies were intended to provide universal economic opportunity, the emerging marketplace frequently reinforces long-standing structural inequalities rather than dismantling them. This study investigates the gendered disparities in NIL access, examining how market dynamics, institutional support, and media representation influence the experiences of male and female athletes. The analysis demonstrates that male athletes, primarily in high-profile revenue sports, benefit from an established media infrastructure and significant institutional investment, allowing them to secure lucrative deals based on athletic performance. Conversely, female athletes must often navigate a “gig-ified” marketplace, performing a distinct “athletic labour of femininity” to manufacture visibility through social media engagement. Furthermore, the rise of third-party collectives and asymmetrical school spending patterns continues to favour male-dominated programs, complicating the future of Title IX compliance. Ultimately, this study concludes that while NIL has provided new avenues for financial capitalization, it has primarily shifted the burden of visibility onto individual female athletes, embedding historical gender norms into the new economic valuation of collegiate sport.