Playboy Pedro describes how the rich spend their vacations

[franksolich]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x5321798

handmade34  (177 posts)      Tue Mar-24-09 02:32 PM
Original message]
 
AIG owns Stowe Mountain Resort in Vermont

I just had a quick phone conversation with my daughter who works at.....blah blah blah blah blah

Atman  (1000+ posts)        Tue Mar-24-09 02:39 PM
Response to Original message
 
2. I posted this yesterday. Here is a link to the story...it's not just Stowe.

It was pretty much ignored. I've noticed that on the rare occasion that I mention snowboarding or skiing, quite a few DUers get irate and call me *gasp* rich for being able to partake, then they go on tirades about how the don't care about rich people's problems.

They completely miss the fact that most "ski" resorts are open year-round and employ hundreds of people -- who are not rich in the slightest -- and contribute vast amounts of money to area economies.

As for the mountain, we spent this past weekend at Stowe, and it was definitely the talk of the town. At least three or four different conversations with people on the lifts/gondola centered around AIG. Read the article at the link. The real "problem" with AIG is industry-wide, because they not only own other resorts, they carry the insurance for 70% of the ski areas in the United States.

All that said...the new Spruce Peak area is phenomenal. And we own it! Yay us, but I think I'd rather have my billions of dollars back.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

By the way, isn't Stowe, Vermont, where the Trapp Family Singers set up shop after leaving national socialist-occupied Austria? 

Of course, Vermont was still a pretty good place back then.

Atman  (1000+ posts)        Tue Mar-24-09 09:46 PM
Response to Reply #7
 
8. The guy who got me into it works 70 hours a week to pay for his ski pass.

He works a manufacturing job at fairly low ($15 or so an hour) wage; he tells me that the first 40 hours go to the household expenses. He works 30 hours of OT (or whatever they'll give him) in order to pay for his lift tickets and gas money. Last year he finally replaced his 12 year old skis at a year-end-closeout. He is as "working class" as they get.

Me, I'm a salaried professional, but my wife and I have to set our priorities similarly, if on a different scale. And I have to reiterate the point about the economies of these small Vermont towns. The "village" of Stowe really is one of the most developed tourist areas of Vermont, yet it is still a village. It's basically a smallish strip of motels, inns, spas and restaurants whose very existence depends upon people driving to the mountain to ski it, hike it, mountain bike it or even paint a picture of it. If that mountain shuts down (which I am not for a moment expecting will actually happen), it takes entire communities with it, just as a GM plant closure creates ghost towns in Michigan.

Vermont is generally a remote, sparsely populated place with a harsh winters and little in the way of industry beyond skiing, cheese and maple syrup. Take away the skiers and snowboarders, hikers and bikers, and "subsistence antiquers" and mom-and-pop syrup stands up 'n down the mountain roads will disappear with them.

Skiing (not so much snowboarding, obviously) tends to have an elitist reputation, largely because of the huge expense. A one-day lift ticket at Stowe on a non-holiday weekend is $84. That's without the $12 hamburgers and $6 beers, and the cost of at least a tank and a half of gas.

But many critics tend to forget that the resorts themselves are no different than other "regular" resorts -- the people working at the places and the towns that support them tend to be very working-class folks. There are a surprising number of year-round jobs at major mountains, as many of them now cater to other markets in the summer with roller coasters, water parks, mountain bike trails, etc.

Then again...the REALLY major resorts owned by major corporate backers tend to hire cheap seasonal labor from Argentina and other other-hemisphere skiing locations, not necessarily locals.

It looks as if Playboy Pedro's trying to rationalize something.

Atman  (1000+ posts)        Wed Mar-25-09 08:17 AM
Response to Reply #9

10. I'm not saying skiing is more expensive; snowboarders tend to be younger and cheaper.

You can pick up a entire snowboard package at Sports Authority for a few hundred bucks. You can't find decent skis --- never mind adding boots and bindings -- for that kind of money. Plus, since snowboarding tends to be more aggressive, younger people tend to get into it.

Personally, I never pay full price for a lift ticket. I follow the ski club "Awareness Days" calendar and never pay more than $25-35 for a ticket. Even at Stowe, because of the ski club, a two day lift ticket cost me only $67 (a regular 1-day ticket is pushing $90 at Stowe). And I usually bring a cooler with my lunch and my own beer.

Stowe, though, is a bad example. It really is a town, not a mountain (the mountains that comprise "Stowe" are actually Mt. Mansfield and Spruce Peak). It has a well-developed tourist area with very, very expensive hotels and spas, and four-star dining. A lot, if not most, of the Vermont ski resorts don't have anything more than a rustic lodge or two at the base. For every Stowe or Stratton there are a couple of Raggeds and Burkes -- excellent skiing and snowboarding with friendlier, smaller, local crowds. Not "elitist" at all. I was just referring to the common misconception about winter sports. That it's somehow only for the wealthy and therefore that we shouldn't care what happens to an AIG ski resort.

It doesn't look like Playboy Pedro's helping the ski economy much, being so cheap and skinflintish as to pack his own lunch.

Geesh.

Atman  (1000+ posts)        Tue Mar-24-09 04:01 PM
Response to Reply #4
 
6. Stowe took the AIG logo off their Web site recently.

I don't know when it happened, but it had to have been fairly recently because I visit the site frequently and just noticed it a couple of days ago. At the bottom where it now says "Partners" with the rotating corporate sponsorship logos, it used to simply be an AIG logo. Hmm. I wonder why they didn't want people to know?

[Flame]

So the guy works 70 hours a week...when does he have time to ski?

[franksolich]

So the guy works 70 hours a week...when does he have time to ski?

I think Playboy Pedro's flailing around trying to find an excuse that skiing isn't just for the rich, which includes Playboy Pedro, and so he made up this imaginary "working class" "friend."

Primitives do things like that.

[The Village Idiot]

So the guy works 70 hours a week...when does he have time to ski?

doesn't the UAW own a resort or something ??

[DixieBelle]

that's a lot of envelope stuffing.......

[Texacon]

So the guy works 70 hours a week...when does he have time to ski?

It's one of those special jobs where you work 70 hours one day and get the next six off but it is a rotation schedule so you may work 70 hours on a Monday this week but have to work 70 hours on a Tuesday the next week.

 

KC

[happy1ga]

Wait a minute. Is my math wrong? This guy, the one who is low paid, works 70 hrs a week, for 15 bucks an hour. Ok, I will assume that the first 40 hrs is at 15 dollars per hr. That would be $600.00. Then say the overtime is time and a half, so the OT, 30 hrs, is paid at 22.00 bucks an hour. That would be $660.00. Since when is $1,260 a week really low paid? I thought low paid was around minimum wage. I lived off of 400 bucks a week, no child support, no welfare, and raised two preteens on it, just 8 yrs ago. Seems to me a single guy could do ok on this. Am I wrong?

[The Village Idiot]

Wait a minute. Is my math wrong? This guy, the one who is low paid, works 70 hrs a week, for 15 bucks an hour. Ok, I will assume that the first 40 hrs is at 15 dollars per hr. That would be $600.00. Then say the overtime is time and a half, so the OT, 30 hrs, is paid at 22.00 bucks an hour. That would be $660.00. Since when is $1,260 a week really low paid? I thought low paid was around minimum wage. I lived off of 400 bucks a week, no child support, no welfare, and raised two preteens on it, just 8 yrs ago. Seems to me a single guy could do ok on this. Am I wrong?

before taxes...

[Karin]

Your math isn't wrong, it would add up to an extra $35K pretax for the year, if he could sustain that OT.  That's just for the gas and lift tickets, mind you, because he's just a working class Joe. 
Man, Playboy sure went on and on and on and on, didn't he?

[franksolich]

Man, Playboy sure went on and on and on and on, didn't he?

When Playboy Pedro does that, as Sigmund Freud would tell us, it means he's trying to justify his affluence to the less-affluent primitives.

Playboy Pedro is an easy read, on any subject, Freudianly.

[happy1ga]

Well, yes, of course before taxes, assuming this is an above board job, and not under the table. Seems PP has white guilt, or wealth guilt. I live in an affluent neighborhood, and most of my neighbors are elderly, but there's a guy here who is about 26, who inherited cash and he does something similar. He tells everyone that he can catch that he is just a regular joe, and wishes he had had to work when he was young doing chores, and getting a job as a teen. He thinks he would be more accepted if people realized he had similar experiences as they, growing up. Of course, the reason people don't want to hang around him isn't due to his easy wealth, they ignore him cause he is a PITA blowhard. Geez.

[franksolich]

He thinks he would be more accepted if people realized he had similar experiences as they, growing up. Of course, the reason people don't want to hang around him isn't due to his easy wealth, they ignore him cause he is a PITA blowhard. Geez.

You just nailed Playboy Pedro.

To a tee.