Season Pass Options/Considerations

[EPB]

If you changed "New technology reduces the price of producing hybrid cars" to "Government visa programs enable pool of low cost laborers to apply for seasonal resort work", you'd have BG's argument encapsulated in this chart. That's not to say it would be feasible to pay ski instructors enough to afford to buy property in Vail, but (edit) international labor certainly reduces maket clearing wages.

These programs might have made more sense before big companies came in and consolidated segments of the hospitality industry (Vail, etc.), but net-net, they are good for industry and bad for labor.

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[deadheadskier]

Raising wages doesn't make jobs magically appear in locations that have zero work to offer 6-9 months a year. That is the #1 reason for the reliance on foreign help. The fact that the labor comes cheap isn't the reason these businesses have gone this route. Talk to any HR department at XYZ Ski area or Beach resort and they will verify this.

The population of domestic workers willing to live a transient lifestyle migrating from ski resorts to beach resorts is very small. The available year round residents to recruit in most of these locations is also very small.

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[mister moose]

Raising wages doesn't make jobs magically appear in locations that have zero work to offer 6-9 months a year. That is the #1 reason for the reliance on foreign help. The fact that the labor comes cheap isn't the reason these businesses have gone this route. Talk to any HR department at XYZ Ski area or Beach resort and they will verify this.

The population of domestic workers willing to live a transient lifestyle migrating from ski resorts to beach resorts is very small. The available year round residents to recruit in most of these locations is also very small.

Why is that? How do you explain paving workers just down the road in Rutland? What do they do in the winter? How is it that ski jobs at Yellowstone Club have a wait list, but in Vermont there's ads in newspapers for jobs that don't get filled? Who plows homeowner driveways in the winter at ski resorts? How does that pay compare to working for the resort?

 

[EPB]

Raising wages doesn't make jobs magically appear in locations that have zero work to offer 6-9 months a year. That is the #1 reason for the reliance on foreign help. The fact that the labor comes cheap isn't the reason these businesses have gone this route. Talk to any HR department at XYZ Ski area or Beach resort and they will verify this.

The population of domestic workers willing to live a transient lifestyle migrating from ski resorts to beach resorts is very small. The available year round residents to recruit in most of these locations is also very small.

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If resorts had no alternative but to hire domestic workers (and pay in the order of twice + the be average wage they pay now), you'd see more 18-20-somethings interested in doing it. This type of wage hike would be way out of the purview of an HR department.

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[mister moose]

And a follow on question -

How did the oil companies find enough workers to work in Alaska where there was ZERO local employment base to draw from?

(I think the answer is obvious)

 

[deadheadskier]

Lol

Yeah let's compare the profits of an oil company vs a ski resort and see how much room exists for substantial enough wage increases to draw more seasonal domestic workers.

Are there 1200 paving workers in Rutland to staff up Killington?

Great comparisons. Keep em coming

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[BenedictGomez]

If you changed "New technology reduces the price of producing hybrid cars" to "Government visa programs enable pool of low cost laborers to apply for seasonal resort work", you'd have BG's argument encapsulated in this chart. That's not to say it would be feasible to pay ski instructors enough to afford to buy property in Vail, but (edit) international labor certainly reduces maket clearing wages.

Bingo.

Raising wages doesn't make jobs magically appear in locations that have zero work to offer 6-9 months a year. That is the #1 reason for the reliance on foreign help.

Seriously? Pick a century; I'll give you an example of higher wages that dragged bodies to destinations.

If resorts had no alternative but to hire domestic workers (and pay in the order of twice + the be average wage they pay now), you'd see more 18-20-somethings interested in doing it. This type of wage hike would be way out of the purview of an HR department.

And you dont even have to "theorize" this, simply think back to the way it was before the visa explosion. The number of foreigners encountered is drastically higher now than it was back then. It's dramatic. To claim that hasn't had a downward effect on real wages paid is a staggering display of economic ignorance.

 

[mister moose]

Lol

Yeah let's compare the profits of an oil company vs a ski resort and see how much room exists for substantial enough wage increases to draw more seasonal domestic workers.

Are there 1200 paving workers in Rutland to staff up Killington?

Great comparisons. Keep em coming

You're being willfully argumentative. The paving crew is an example, not the sum total of a resorts employment base.

As far as oil profits vs ski profits, that wasn't the question, the question was how to find enough workers. The market will adapt to the price point of the product cost, it ALWAYS does.

PS, oil company's profits run at about 8%. Not that different. Might even be quite similar, given the vast swings in oil supply and prices, they are on as big or bigger revenue roller coaster than ski areas. The difference is scale, for some reason you can't see things in proportion.

 

[deadheadskier]

Man if only ASC and Intrawest had paid locals $20/hr to run their cash registers, they would have made a killing and still be around today.



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[mister moose]

Man if only ASC and Intrawest had paid locals $20/hr to run their cash registers, they would have made a killing and still be around today.

If market conditions for labor supported $20/hr for cashiers in New England, then all New England resorts would have that labor cost and all New England resorts would cover that added cost in their pricing.

At least I think that's the appropriate response to that inaccurate, misleading statement.

 

[EPB]

Man if only ASC and Intrawest had paid locals $20/hr to run their cash registers, they would have made a killing and still be around today.



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Why would they do that when they could just use the visa system their industry (broadly speaking) advocated for?

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[BenedictGomez]

You're being willfully argumentative.

That's what I'm suggesting. I don't even think he believes what he's saying.

 

[FBGM]

Lol

Yeah let's compare the profits of an oil company vs a ski resort and see how much room exists for substantial enough wage increases to draw more seasonal domestic workers.

Are there 1200 paving workers in Rutland to staff up Killington?

Great comparisons. Keep em coming

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I bet there are 1200 crack heads on unemployment that could bump chairs. Free Narcan instead of season pass

 

[BenedictGomez]

Why would they do that when they could just use the visa system their industry (broadly speaking) advocated for?

Yup. And aided by the Chamber of Commerce, which is ever-lobbying for more & more visa entrants for cheaper labor.

 

[EPB]

And you dont even have to "theorize" this, simply think back to the way it was before the visa explosion. The number of foreigners encountered is drastically higher now than it was back then. It's dramatic. To claim that hasn't had a downward effect on real wages paid is a staggering display of economic ignorance.

It's funny you mention this. Im too young to remember the 80s, but I do remember Attitash having turnstiles into ~the late 90s. The foreign labor use really started to pick up after those went away. I doubt the turnstiles were very effective, as it took 20 years since they were removed at Attitash before they made a comeback with RFID. Technology, of course, is the antidote to high labor costs. Eventually it becomes cost effective to find a way to automate naggingly high labor jobs way.

As an aside, my mom actually liked the "smart ticket" system they used to offer at Attitash because you bought "points" that could be used whenever you wanted during the season. Different lifts cost a different number of points, but as a lower intermediate who was petrified of getting run into, it was a good way to get a few runs in from 8-10 before the crowds came out.

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[icecoast1]

Lol

Yeah let's compare the profits of an oil company vs a ski resort and see how much room exists for substantial enough wage increases to draw more seasonal domestic workers.

Are there 1200 paving workers in Rutland to staff up Killington?

Great comparisons. Keep em coming

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Vail Resorts made hundreds of millions in profits for the fiscal year 2019, seems like theres plenty of room there to pay competitive wages there, at a minimum to the core people you can't run a resort without

 

[deadheadskier]

I'm not against higher wages at ski resorts. I think people are

A. Overstating the impact foreign workers have on wages. Vail might be highly profitable, but the small businesses in resort towns offering similar jobs certainly aren't. If Stan's ski shop is paying their rental counter worker $12/hr or Joe's deli their sandwich maker $11/hr; what incentive does Vail have to pay much more? In my experience locals tend to choose the small businesses over the big resorts because they tend to have shorter off seasons.

B. Covid aside, look at the unemployment rates over the past twenty + years. It's never been all that bad outside of the 2009 economic crisis. Service industry workers aren't going to choose destinations where the cash tills ring six months a year at best over secure 12 month income in high density population centers. Young people have been leaving resort areas for decades.

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[snoseek]

My only issues were on the early and late seasons when I had to work the h2b workers as they were contracted to make 40 and the local ski bums got severely cut. That part was not so easy

 

[BenedictGomez]

My only issues were on the early and late seasons when I had to work the h2b workers as they were contracted to make 40 and the local ski bums got severely cut. That part was not so easy

But I'm sure all of those ski bums stuck it out, and none of them ever left because of it (yes, sarcasm).

 

[machski]

Sunday River thinks it's a great time to sell $.5m-$1m lots...per an email from TODAY...

https://sundayriverliving.com/merri...s://sundayriverliving.com/merrill-hill/​&nck=

Just part of that development they are trying to move forward with. Probably not a bad time to open up that offering to that particular clientel. What I thought was more odd was the rekindled Dream Maker Lodge Condo development. The original three years ago had mostly 1 and 2 bed units with 1 beds starting in the mid to high $200k's. Now it's primarily all 2 bed units starting at over half a million with 4 penthouse units of 3 or 4 beds, starting over a million. That is the one that blew me away, not so much the lots. The lot cost was a given high on Merrill Hill above the already pricey and sold out Glade Units. Those lot sales will pay for the lift/trail/snowmaking install up there.

As to the original point of this thread, Season Pass Options, Sunday River also announced yesterday season pass products should go back on sale early September with regular tickets to go on sale later in the fall.

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