Yay, now wealthy people doing fancy stuff like skiing have more options for travel, I’m so glad, I worry about how hard things must be for wealthy people constantly
I’d like to know how skiing is a rich people thing in Europe when we have schools, even in the poorest cities, that organise weekly long trips to the mountains for all their pupils. Like those pupils from the former mines areas near Lille that was mentioned in the article, where the uk people will have to change trains. All of this being mostly possible because we pay taxes for them to be able to go. What you consider a luxury may not be one for others.
At least in Germany the school organizes the trip but the parents pay for it. It’s not covered or at least hit fully by taxes
I had the same thing in the States, but we get a pretty steep discount through the school. The local hill knows that those school ski trips are how a lot of students get introduced to the sport.
You save some money here, too, but you would still be in the three digits.
Oh. Yeah this is a pretty small locally owned mountain. Right now cheapest Ticket + rentals + group lesson are $125 without the school discount. I think with the school it was something like $60-$70 for all of that, but that was more than a decade ago. For the high-school age kids they do ski-club as well, basically discounted night skiing for a few consecutive weeks after a school day.
Here parents have to pay a part based on their income to the school but it doesn’t cover all the costs, a big partpart of the financing comes through various financial helps set by the state and are at the end of the day paid by taxpayers. I really like this system. Having the class parents pay for all of it can be harsh and seen as unjust, especially if you have the higher income ones pay the difference for the ones who wouldn’t be able to afford it or if it’s the same price for everyone yet still unaffordable for some who have their kid stay at home while others go have fun in the snow.
Skiing for adults doesn’t cost much.
A pair of ski and the ski boots can be bought used for as low as 20€ for boths.The most costly thing is housing, which vary a lot for each station, the cheapest have housing for 400€ and the lift.pass for 150€.
It’s cheap enough that students organize ski trips (and manage to get even cheaper price by bulk booking, and getting students price)
