Last night I was catching up on some threads on SOTW and I happened to come across a very interesting one titled: Is Selmer going to price themselves out of business?
Typical of SOTW, the thread quickly turned into Selmer bashing, but I found a few posts by JimTD that I combined into one quote. His points certainly had me doing a re-think:
- 1970 California average home price…$23,094…
- 2000 California average home price. $211,500 (Census data)
- 1970 New Selmer Alto $625 (as reported by a SOTW member)
- 2008 New Ref. 54 alto $4979 (from Prowinds)
- U.S. Federal minimum wage 1970 $1.15
- U.S. Federal minimum wage 2008 $6.55
- 543 hrs. to 1970 price at 1970 minimum wage.
- 760 hrs. to 2008 price at 2008 minimum wage.
- 3 Hr. Jazz gig 1970 $50
- 3 Hr. Jazz gig 2008 $50
I didn’t work as a musician in the 1970s, but I know that in the 1980s I was getting the same rate of pay that I’m getting now. Clubs are paying the same. Union scale, at least in this part of the world, is also the same. Instrument and home prices however, have climbed exponentially.
Ah yes… These numbers that JimTD provided, make me longingly think of ads like these…
…this is just my blog. My “real” website is www.bassic-sax.info. If you’re looking for sax info, you should check it out too.There’s lots there!
