It’s the Economy, Stupid!

Written by Rue on September 19, 2008 – 5:53 pm

Jobs are few and far between. Fifty percent of homes are in foreclosure. It’s nearly impossible to fill up your gas tank for under $60, let alone find gas to put in your car. A trip to the grocery store is 40% more expensive than it was this time ago. Utilities have doubled. Cheap plane tickets don’t exist. Vacation? Forget about it. The economy is awful, and it’s keeping me from the only men who have ever made me cry: the Braves.

Attendance at Turner Field is lower than it has been in years.  Obviously, the cause has nothing to do with trading away some of Atlanta’s favorite players like Mark Teixeira, Mark Kotsay, Andruw Jones last year, and the ringer himself, Royce Ring (sorry, I had to), or being 19 games behind with absolutely zero hopes of playoffs this season. The clear culprit: the economy and its impact on the average Atlantan. And you thought the insurmountable fury was the Nationals.

I’m a numbers girl, so I did a quick little analysis based on the BravesBlast staff baseball attendance (this discludes my disloyal self).  With season tickets in the cheapest seats available, the average cost per game per ticket is $3. To expand upon our cheapness, we park approximately a half mile away and pay $5 for that coveted parking spot. For the sake of avoiding distractions, we don’t drink anything other than the multiple $1 waters that we pick up from street vendors, and usually grab a hot dog to induce a true game time vibe. Per person, this totals $10 per game, not including gas mileage, nor the beer that was purchased for the cute little thing of the opposite sex sitting four rows back. Alright, fine, round up to $20 for the Braves experience when you include the aforementioned. $20*60 games per year (average) = $1200 per season for the sake of the Bravos. The average income of a 25 year old in the US is $28,000 before taxes, and about $21,000 after. Baseball season on average is 6 months, leaving that half-year income at $10,500. Over that time period, that results in baseball accounting for almost 11.5% of take-home income! To be honest, for as much as I love Buddy Carlyle, I’m fairly sure I’d rather eat or pay my electric bill than see him in person from a few hundred feet away. I suppose that 8×10 on my wall will have to suffice.

To make matters worse, the above analysis was for a cheap, single 25 year-old like myself. Just imagine the parent with their 2.5 kids who needs to park close, buy decent tickets, and feed everyone.  The Braves were rocking it out early in the season during home stands. Obviously the home town crowd pulled on their heart strings, driving them towards excellence, and motivating them to victory. They aren’t losing because of a lack of big name talent, or injury, or trades. They are losing because of the drop in fan attendance. The fans aren’t attending because of cost. Therefore, the Braves are losing because of the economy.

I’m done. Ha.

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