Clemson students petition against ticket pricing plan

[UK2K]

On the same day Clemson's Board of Trustees announced a big raise for Coach Dabo Swinney, students and alumni of the university were petitioning to keep their football tickets free, but the school says there is some misinformation about the newly proposed ticket plan.

Julian Taylor, the Chairman of Athletics with Clemson's student government, created a petition on change.org saying the university is pushing to charge students $225 for tickets to sit in the lower deck at Clemson football games beginning in fall 2016. The petition has amassed more than 8,000 signatures from students and alumni, with a goal of 10,000. University leaders say the petition is creating some confusion over whether the $225 would be a mandatory fee.

Ok, I don't really care about whether or not students have to pay for tickets. IMO, if you want better seats, you pay for better seats. Seems obvious. But this line from the student body president stuck out to me:

Student Body President Joey Wilson believes the plan is divisive, "We are concerned that this new policy will divide the Clemson Family between students who have the means to pay for season tickets and those who do not, and this has many negative implications."

As I thought about it, I thought, Joey is probably right. But, given the way our country is headed right now (the wrong ****ing direction), are the prices of sporting events discriminatory?

I brought this up because the story of the sorority forced to cancel their annual Derby party was faced with the accusation of 'having to buy a ticket is economic discrimination'.

So is it? In a way, yeah, if you can't afford it, you could (again, in today's world) argue it's discriminatory. Local governments have used property taxes as a means to move the poor out of certain areas with high property value, so yeah you can be discriminated against economically. But then where does it stop? TV's? Cell phones? Does everyone have a right to an Xbox One?

[DukeDelonte13]

college football tickets are a different thing than Xboxes.


People pay a crap ton of tuition to attend school, and contrary to popular belief the vast majority of college football programs eat money and resources, most aren't making money for the school. The school's highest payed employees are typically football coaches. Most schools offer free or heavily discounted tickets to students.


If I attended an expensive 4 year uni with a football team and in year 3 they decided to jack up my prices i'd be unhappy about it. I don't think it's a form of economic discrimination though.

[UK2K]

college football tickets are a different thing than Xboxes.


People pay a crap ton of tuition to attend school, and contrary to popular belief the vast majority of college football programs eat money and resources, most aren't making money for the school. The school's highest payed employees are typically football coaches. Most schools offer free or heavily discounted tickets to students.


If I attended an expensive 4 year uni with a football team and in year 3 they decided to jack up my prices i'd be unhappy about it. I don't think it's a form of economic discrimination though.

Despite the fact that the price you are paying for your ticket is 1/100th the price a non-student would pay?

Also, it's not a mandatory thing (to my understanding), but the option to pay into it to be able to sit in the lower level as opposed to the upper deck. So they are essentially telling students that if you want better seats, you need to pay for them.

To the student body president's point, I could see how some may not be able to afford the price increase, and it could be seen as discriminatory to lower income students who pay the same tuition as every other student but can't afford the higher priced seats.

Of course, the same could be argued for the price of anything really.

So now we are walking a fine line between what is, and isn't, discriminatory.

[KyrieTheFuture]

At Syracuse there was a built in athletic fee that a lot of students hated because they were paying for something they didn't use or care about

[DeuceWallaces]

Student tickets are about half regular seats. Not 1/100th. It's a bummer for their students that they're taking advantage of their success and milking them as opposed to season ticket holders and alumni.

Student sections shouldn't be lower bowl only, but it's fair to give them several sections with the lower bowl seats going to a combination of upperclassmen and early payments from those who are in good standing.