Can WWE Afford To Pay Its Wrestlers Healthcare?

Oliver's primary goal was to call for the company to drop the "independent contractors" label and officially recognise its performers as employees. The difference in the wording is subtle, but the legal repercussions of this would be huge as, suddenly, they'd find themselves with over 200 wrestlers who were suddenly the beneficiaries to a host of new benefits. Healthcare, payroll liability, travel expenses, retirement plan, 401Ks, all things American's in any other line of work are normally entitled to.

WWE's response to the segment deflected its core message entirely though, simply saying that; "The health and wellness of our performers is the single most important aspect of our business, and we have a comprehensive, long-standing Talent Wellness programme. We invite John Oliver to attend WrestleMania this Sunday to learn more about our company."

Now yes, WWE has taken huge strides in recent years to ensure that list above doesn't become any longer, and that incidents like the Chris Benoit tragedy don't happen again. As important as The Wellness Policy is though, it's got nothing to do with the working rights Oliver is pushing for. Like they've done in the past, their approach to valid criticism over their working practices is to simply imply that these are "outsiders" seeking to undermine the legitimacy of the art form. A position they know fans will rally around in their defence.

Their problem here though is that Oliver himself is a wrestling fan. Front-loading his segment with that fact and repeatedly defending the entertainment value of the product, his takedown carries a legitimacy because it's coming from a man who clearly understands the appeal of the industry. This didn't translate to overly protests at WrestleMania (at least none that we saw), but with the hype from the weekend dying down it's got the potential to be the biggest wrestling story of 2019.

But what's the reality of it? Is it actually something WWE would be able to implement? Are the calls for them to so drastically change their operating practices either fair or possible?