The US Women's National Team's historic equal pay deal is already inspiring other countries' soccer stars to 'fight for' fair wages

• The USWNT agreed to a historic deal that secures a pay structure that is identical to what applies to the men's team.
• The agreement with US Soccer equalizes World Cup prize money between the men's and women's teams.

After years of fighting its own federation for fair wages, the US Women's National Soccer Team has finally secured equal pay.

US Soccer announced Wednesday that its men's and women's national teams had agreed to identical Collective Bargaining Agreements, that equalized pay and resources afforded to the men's and women's squads. Perhaps most notably, the deal evenly splits World Cup prize money between the two national teams.

No other country's soccer federation has ever taken the revolutionary step to pool FIFA prize money, which is significantly higher on the men's side.

"I think this is going to have international ramifications in sport in general," US Soccer President Cindy Parlow Cone told TODAY. "And hopefully into the business world as well."

In fact, it already has.

Moments after news of the agreement became public, FC Barcelona superstar and Spain women's national team captain Irene Paredes told Insider that the USWNT's successful fight for equal pay inspires her, and likely other women's players across the globe, to "fight for" fair wages and resources of their own.

"Now there's a reason and someone who is doing it, so we have to fight for that," Paredes said. "I think that for playing with your national team, you can't make a difference between a man and a woman. Of course there are a lot of things of filling the stadium or not, or selling T-shirts or not, but because of the fact of wearing the same T-shirt, it should be the same."

"I just say congrats," she added. "And I hope that the rest of the national teams can reach that."

The heart of soccer's pay disparity issues lies with FIFA, which offers a considerably larger prize pool for the men's World Cup than for the women's. At this year's men's World Cup in Qatar, the 32 teams vying for soccer's most prestigious trophy will also compete for a share of the $400 million pot, according to The Guardian.

In the women's tournament, which will take place in Australia and New Zealand the following year, the same number of teams will compete for $60 million total.

In 2016, FIFA President Gianni Infantino told Sports Illustrated that the stature of "women's football in the US is not yet comparable to what women's football should be around the world." He says that the vast divide justifies the disparity between the men's and women's World Cup prize pools.

"So what our task must be is to develop women's football, to invest much more," Infantino added. "Of course the adjustment of the prize money goes with that as well."

But Walker Zimmerman, a defender for the USMNT and a member of the players' association leadership group, challenged the notion that "equal pay for men and women was not possible."

"That did not stop us, and we went ahead and achieved it," he added via US Soccer's announcement. "We hope this will awaken others to the need for this type of change, and will inspire FIFA and others around the world to move in the same direction."