We're not sponsored athletes on cereal boxes and Gatorade bottles.

我們沒有被贊助成為麥片和開特力運動飲料的代言人。

I started driving for DoorDash.

我開始為 DoorDash 開車。

I worked at Panera, a bank. The financial strain is huge.

我在 Panera 麵包店、銀行工作，我的財務壓力很大。

That's because unless they win a medal, Olympians don't get paid for competing at the games.

那是因為除非他們贏得獎牌，否則奧運選手不會因為參加比賽而獲得報酬。

You see someone that's on television all the time and assume all Olympic athletes are famous, all you have to do is get a medal and you'll be rich. And nothing could be further from the truth.

你看到一個人一直上電視，就假設所有的奧運選手都很有名，他們只需要獲得獎牌就會變得富有，但事實並非如此。

They also have a long list of expenses to train for their sport.

他們還有一連串費用來支付他們的運動訓練。

And you also are responsible for your coach, making sure that they are paid and compensated accordingly. Massage therapists, nutritionists. Something like a $250,000 earning turns into $125,000 really quick.

你也要對你的教練負責，確保他們得到相應的報酬和補償，還要請按摩師、營養師。大約 250,000 美元的收入很快就會變成 125,000 美元。

So how do Olympians make money, and why isn't it enough? Unlike countries such as the UK or Singapore, American Olympians don't get paid to attend the Olympics.

那麼奧運選手是如何賺錢的，而且為什麼不夠呢？不像英國或新加坡等國家，美國奧運選手參加奧運並不會得到報酬。

If you're not going to be able to afford it, and if you're not doing well, there's like six other people waiting in line just to have the opportunity.

如果你負擔不起，也做得不好，後面可能還有六個人在排隊等待機會。

We are the only major country in the world, and one of very few countries period, where the government does not get involved in funding its Olympic team.

我們是世界上唯一的主要國家，也是政府不參與資助奧運代表隊的極少數國家之一。

But there are three main ways they can make money for being an athlete.

但是，作為運動員，他們可以通過三種主要方式賺錢。

The first, stipends. Athletes can get stipends directly from the US Olympic & Paralympic Committee or from the groups that run the Olympic sports teams, called the national governing bodies.

第一，津貼。 運動員可以直接從美國奧林匹克和殘奧委員會或管理奧林匹克運動隊的團體，稱為全國性運動組織獲得津貼。

We pay to our very top athletes around $4,000 a month, plus performance bonuses.

我們每月向頂級運動員支付大約 4,000 美元，外加績效獎金。

An Olympic gold-medal rower told USA Today she receives $2,000 a month.

一位奧運金牌賽艇運動員告訴《今日美國》，她每月會收到 2,000 美元。

Monica won bronze at the Rio 2016 Olympics.

Monica 在 2016 年里約奧運上獲得銅牌。

We get a stipend, and it is $300 a month.

我們有津貼，每月 300 美元。

- How much funding an athlete gets depends on performance, and... - Their ability is to be able to earn medals.

- 運動員獲得多少資金取決於表現，並且... - 他們的能力是要能夠獲得獎牌。

So it's a tough kind of balancing act that the NGBs are doing to figure out, how do we support the athletes that are up-and-coming, but then also how do we make sure that those who are doing awesome right now are well cared for?

因此，NGBs 正在採取一種困難的平衡措施，以弄清楚我們該如何支持嶄露頭角的運動員，以及我們要如何確保那些現在表現出色的人得到很好的照顧？

Lauryn Williams competed in Olympic track and field and bobsled. She was the first American woman to win medals in both the Summer and Winter Olympics.

Lauryn Williams 參加了奧運的田徑和雪橇比賽，她是第一位在夏季和冬季奧運會上都獲得獎牌的美國女性。

The funding was quite different between the two though. Bobsled is a much smaller Olympic sport, and so there's three medals that we can earn.

兩者之間的資金非常不同：雪橇是一項小得多的奧運會項目，因此我們可以獲得三枚獎牌。

Compare that to track and field, where 128 American athletes are headed to the Olympic Games competing for 48 gold medals.

相比之下，田徑場有 128 名美國運動員前往奧運爭奪 48 枚金牌。

In swimming, there's a lot of money, gymnastics, there's a lot of money. NBA, I mean, we don't even have to cover that one; it's the niche sports that really struggle the most.

游泳可以賺很多錢，體操可以賺很多錢，NBA 更不用講，根本不需要資助。真正有困境的大部分都是小眾運動。

Athletes can also make money through sponsorships.

運動員也可以通過贊助賺錢。

A company covers some of their athlete's expenses in exchange for its logo on the athlete's uniform.

一家公司會承擔其運動員的部分費用來換取該標誌出現在其運動員的衣服上。

More often, these sponsorships are performance-based, meaning an athlete has to win a certain number of competitions.

更常見的是，這些贊助是基於表現的，意味著運動員必須贏得一定數量的比賽。

Athleta now sponsors Simone Biles; TYR Sport sponsors Katie Ledecky for $7 million. 2K Sports and Nike sponsor Kevin Durant, who rakes in $40 million in sponsorship money every year.

Athleta 現在贊助西蒙·拜爾斯；TYR Sport 以 700 萬美元贊助姬蒂·雷德基；2K Sports 和耐克贊助了凱文杜蘭特，他每年的贊助費高達 4000 萬美元。

Some of us as athletes have been really fortunate to gain individual sponsorships. That's been hard to come by because people don't know water polo.

我們中的一些運動員真的很幸運能夠獲得個人贊助，這很難得到，因為大家根本不知道水球這個運動。

Sponsorship deals among athletes are inconsistent, ranging from hundreds of dollars to millions.

運動員之間的贊助協議並不一致，從數百美元到數百萬美元不等。

I've seen athletes get very upset because, you know, they've performed really well, better than their competitor even, but the competitor has a lot more sponsorship opportunity.

我見過運動員明明表現得非常好，甚至比他們的競爭對手還要好，但對方卻有更多的贊助機會而讓他們感到非常沮喪。

That's because sponsorships don't just depend on the sport. They also depend on the athlete's popularity.

那是因為贊助不僅僅取決於這項運動，還取決於運動員受歡迎的程度。

When sponsors and brands are looking at athletes, they're looking at marketability, the return on investment they're going to get.

當贊助商和品牌關注運動員時，他們關注的是有沒有市場，即他們將獲得的投資回報。

It can literally be you have a huge following on Instagram, or you can just be so good that it's undeniable.

你在 Instagram 上擁有大量追蹤者，或者是無可否認的優秀都可以獲得贊助。

Ultra chocolate.

超級巧克ㄌ。

Nailing a coveted sponsorship is hard. Athletes have to go out and get their own sponsors.

獲得夢寐以求的贊助很難。運動員必須出去尋找自己的贊助商。

Finally, athletes can win prize money.

最後，運動員可以透過贏得獎金賺錢。

Competitions leading up to the Olympics, like the Diamond League meets, can have $10,000 first-place prizes.

奧運前的比賽，比如鑽石聯賽，第一名可以獲得 10,000 美元的獎金。

For me, when I get prize money, I have to immediately disburse that to bills and savings, and also I have to think about, I can't lose, or I can't come in a certain place because I have to make a certain amount of money to either break even or to gain a profit. So always going into a race with that is an immense amount of pressure.

對我來說，當我拿到獎金時，我必須立即支付帳單和存起來，而且我還必須想著我不能輸，或者不能去某些地方，因為我必須賺一定數量的錢才能收支平衡，或是獲得利潤，所以，總是要參加比賽變成是一種巨大的壓力。

The International Olympic Committee doesn't award athletes cash prizes for medals. But some countries do. The United States is one of them.

國際奧委會不向運動員頒發獎牌的現金獎勵，但有些國家有頒發，美國就是其中之一。

You know, the USOPC has something called Operation Gold. So if you earn a medal at the Olympic Games, there's prize money for the top three places there.

USOPC 有一個叫做「黃金行動」的計畫，如果在奧運上獲得獎牌，那麼前三名就有獎金。

In every sport, the USOPC awards a $37,500 medal bonus for gold, $22,500 for silver, and $15,000 for bronze. But the USA's medal bonuses are lower than what other nations offer.

在每項運動中，USOPC 授予金牌 37,500 美元、銀牌 22,500 美元和銅牌 15,000 美元的獎牌獎金，但美國的獎牌獎金其實低於其他國家。

It's a one-time payment.

這是一次性付款。

And those bonuses are only up for grabs every four years when the Olympics come around again. So what kind of consistent salaries do athletes get? Well, it's hard to say.

這些獎金每四年只有在奧運再次舉行時才有機會獲得。那麼運動員會得到什麼樣穩定的薪水呢？ 其實，這很難說。

But we do know in 2012, half of the US track and field Olympic team made $15,000 or less a year from the sport, including stipends, prize money, and sponsorships. Compare that to the salary of USA Track & Field's CEO, who earned $1.2 million in 2018.

但我們確實知道，在 2012 年，美國田徑奧運代表隊的一半隊員每年從這項運動中獲得的收入不超過 15,000 美元，包括津貼、獎金和贊助。相比之下，美國田徑運動首席執行官的薪水在 2018 年收入卻是 120 萬美元。

Plus, there are also hefty costs associated with competing at this level.

此外，在這個級別進行競爭也需要付出高昂的代價。

15% to 20% generally goes to your agent. So that's money that doesn't exist anymore. And then you also have to pay taxes.

獎金的 15% 到 20% 通常會給經紀人，所以這些錢交出去就不存在了，然後你還得交稅。

Coaches can cost more than $100 an hour; that bobsled Lauryn competed in costs about $30,000.

教練每小時的費用可能超過 100 美元；Lauryn 參加的雪橇比賽的競爭成本約為 30,000 美元。

If I got to get shoes every two to three months, that's $200, $300.

如果我每兩到三個月買一次鞋，那就是 200 美元、300 美元。

There's the price of gym time, massage and sports medicine appointments, dieticians, lots of healthy food, you name it.

在健身房運動、按摩和運動醫學看診、營養師、許多健康食品，應有盡有的項目都要花費。

In 2012, US News & World Report found it costs up to $100,000 a year for athletes to be Olympians.

2012 年，《美國新聞與世界報導》發現，運動員成為奧運選手的成本高達 10 萬美元。

During the course of my career, I was really fortunate. I never earned less than $250,000, but there's a lot of expenses associated with being an athlete, because you are in fact a business, and a business has overhead; something like a $250,000 earning turns into $125,000 really quick.

在我的職業生涯中，我真的很幸運，因為我的收入從未低於 250,000 美元，但是作為一名運動員有很多費用，因為你實際上是一家企業，而企業有管理費用，像是 250,000 美元的收入很快就會變成 125,000 美元。

Many athletes have turned to crowdsourcing to supplement their incomes: Monica started one to fund her way to Tokyo. It's now up to $30,000; Aaron's GoFundMe helped finance his way to the Olympic track and field trials in July.

許多運動員已經轉向大眾來資助他們的收入：Monica 開始募集她去東奧的資金，現在募到了 30,000 美元；Aaron 的 GoFundMe 幫忙資助了他參加 7 月的奧運田徑選拔賽。

In a matter of 22 hours, I wanna say I was, I had all the money that I needed, and it was such a wild moment for me.

我想說的是，在短短 22 小時內就我得到了我所需要的資金，這對我來說真是太瘋狂了。

But most athletes have to take on part-time work.

但大多數運動員不得不從事兼職工作。

Working a part-time job at Scheels, which is an all-sports store here in Iowa City.

我在愛荷華的一家叫 Scheels 的全體育用品店打工。

You know, a lot of girls on our team are coaches; I own a business.

我們隊中有很多女生都是教練，但我擁有一家企業。

And the pay gap among athletes has only worsened during the pandemic.

在疫情期間，運動員之間的薪酬差距只會惡化。

A lot of hourly jobs went away for a good period of time during COVID, and then there was training facilities being shut down.

在 COVID 發生的很長一段時間內，許多時薪工作消失了，然後訓練設施也都關閉了。

I would ref competitions here in New York City, but all of them were canceled, so I wasn't making money from that. I didn't even have ways of making money for rent. Everything was shut down. Like, even social media companies weren't even paying for us to be putting out different campaigns. So it was definitely rough.

我會在紐約市這裡的比賽擔任裁判，但所有比賽都被取消了，所以我沒有從中賺到錢，我甚至沒有辦法賺錢付房租。所有東西都停擺， 就連社交媒體公司也沒有為我們推出不同的活動付費，所以這絕對是很艱難的。

There was meets that I thought I would be able to get in and clean up and you know, make money I didn't have. It really set me back financially.

本來有一些比賽我可以參加賺錢，賺到我需要的錢，這真的讓我在經濟上遇到困境。

It's left Olympians and their families struggling to make ends meet.

這讓奧運選手和他們的家人努力維持生計。

I've been raised by a single mother since I'm 8 years old, so she definitely was funding everything when I was younger. She went into credit card debt because of me.

我從 8 歲起就由單親媽媽撫養長大，所以在我還年輕的時候她資助了我的一切，而她因為我欠了信用卡債。

I feel like I am one of the best in America. So if I can do that while I'm at one point working two jobs and DoorDash and everything like that, then I can't imagine what I can do if I didn't have to do that.

我覺得我是美國最頂尖的選手人之一，所以，如果我可以在同時從事兩份工作和 DoorDash 的工作還能成為最頂尖的，那麼我無法想像如果我不必這樣忙碌的話，我能夠成為多厲害的選手。

There's times where I don't even have money in my bank account.

曾經我的銀行帳戶裡甚至沒有錢。

Things have shifted a bit to help athletes. At the 2018 games, the USOPC upped the medal bonuses by 50%. They changed the rules so athletes won't be taxed on their medal bonuses if they make under $1 million annually; US Olympians used to have to pay as much as $8,900 in taxes on a gold medal bonus.

但事情發生了一些變化來幫助運動員。在 2018 年的比賽中，USOPC 將獎牌獎金提高了 50%，他們改變了規則，因此如果運動員年收入低於 100 萬美元，他們的獎牌獎金將不會被徵稅；美國奧運選手過去必須為金牌獎金繳納高達 8,900 美元的稅款。

The IOC has recently eased Rule 40, which prohibited athletes from making money off their image rights before, during, and after the Olympics. But now, athletes' sponsors can run certain ads during the Rule 40 period.

國際奧委會最近放寬了第 40 條規則，該規則禁止運動員在奧運之前、期間和之後通過他們的肖像權賺錢，但是現在，運動員的贊助商可以在第 40 規則規定的期間內也能投放特定廣告。

And in 2020, the USOPC launched the Athlete Marketing Project, which better connects athletes with sponsors. But the moves haven't been sweeping enough: Phil thinks that some of the funding for Team USA should come from the US government.

並且在 2020 年，USOPC 啟動了運動員營銷項目，更好地將運動員與贊助商聯繫起來，但這些措施還不夠徹底：Phil 認為美國隊的部分資金應該來自美國政府。

That money could ensure that our US Olympic team are treated equally to the level of achievement or treated to a salary that is appropriate for them representing this country.

這筆錢可以確保我們的美國奧運代表隊得到平等對待，達到成就水平，或得到適合他們代表這個國家的薪水。

Across America, athletes are facing a decision: is it all worth it?

全美國的運動員都面臨著一個決定：這一切都值得嗎？

Twenty-seven times over, yes, yes, and yes. Even if it was half the income, I don't think that I would regret one moment having participated in sport.

絕對值得，即使只有收入的一半，我也不認為我會因為參加體育運動而後悔。

I get to play the sport I love every single day. That's wealth. That's being rich, but I wouldn't be upset if in the future, we were able to make some more money and not necessarily have to have two jobs.

我每天都可以參與我喜歡的運動，那就是財富，那就是富裕。但是，如果將來我們能夠賺更多的錢，也不必同時擁有兩份工作，我就不會感到沮喪。

It kind of puts a chip on my shoulder to go even harder, to compete at the best and compete with the best so that I can take myself out of this position.

這有點像是在我肩上放上籌碼，讓我更加努力，以絕佳狀態競爭並與最頂尖的選手競爭，這樣我就可以擺脫現在這個位置。

That's my only like, question over the next three years of, do I continue another three years of being broke? I wanna go back. I wanna have the opportunity to win an individual medal. But is it worth being broke again?

這是我未來三年唯一的問題，我是否還要繼續破產三年？我想回去比賽，我想要有機會贏得個人獎牌，但值得我再次破產嗎？