Sophia Bush always made less money than her male co-stars on One Tree Hill.

Although Sophia, 42, was one of the stars of the teen drama series from 2003 to 2012, she admitted that the male actors, including ex-husband Chad Michael Murray, were paid more money than her.

When asked on The Burnouts podcast if she ever got a chance to negotiate her salary, Sophia said: "We weren't really given the opportunity to do that. They would always tell us we were on the verge of getting cancelled so that we wouldn't try."

However, she praised her legal team for standing up for her before season four.

She said: "They just said, 'Listen, we know none of the girls are making what the boys are making. But you cannot pay her a third of what the woman making the least amount of money on the show is making'. They really went to bat for me."

However, Sophia's pay increase only brought her salary up to "under 20 per cent" of her male co-stars.

She said: "I was finally being paid equally to the second-lowest paid woman on the cast. So, under 20 percent of what my male co-star was making on the show.

"Part of the reason they like to make teen television is because they don't really have to pay young people very much money. Because I had been an added character - even though I'd be a series regular. I was essentially told, 'This is all we can afford to pay you. Take it or leave it. It's never going to get any better than this.'

"It was a baptism by fire in the financial space. You want to work so you say yes, but when you make money, 10 per cent goes to your agent and 10 per cent goes to your manager and five percent goes to your lawyer. Then you have to buy into your union and you have to figure out how to incorporate a business."