Monday, May 9, 2011

Milking the Cow

Alright... after a mostly successful lift-in, it's finally time to start thinking about sailing!! And the first thing that comes to mind is how much it's going to cost. If you're not buddies with current club leaders (in which case it costs nothing), then it's cash up front, and non-refundable.

The graph shows the change in membership prices since the early 1990s, compared to the overall rate of inflation. Ouch. The numbers plotted are the price of a regular annual membership. It's apparent that the cost of joining Hoofers has far outpaced the rate of inflation. But why..?

Next time, we'll plot instructor pay over time and find out. :)

NOTE:
1. Some (but not all) years offered an "early annual" discount which explains the apparent dip in 2001. Most people took advantage (the regular price, if you waited, was typically $30 more), so the discounted price is what's plotted.
2. The prices include the "deposit" since fewer than 10% of club members ever get that money back.
3. Some years had additional fleet-specific fees (e.g. J skipper, Keelboat, short board, etc.); these were problematic and are not included here.
4. The cost for current students and non-student Union members was the same until the 2003-04 fiscal year, at which point they decided to really stick it to Union members.
5. The fiscal year doesn't match the sailing season, so in a sense, the years are +/- six months either way.
6. The chart was generated using CricketGraph for Mac.

No comments:

Post a Comment