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Comment by Kluny | Hacker News Reader

Really, taking their adult autonomy away is the first step? How about education?

This might be anecdotal, but I feel like we don't hear these athlete bankruptcy stories as often about hockey players. Why? Because they're all white, not black. Putting a kid through junior hockey is expensive and hockey players tend to come from privileged homes with much better financial education than young black football players. They get just as many knocks on the head, but they get better advice from their father's accountant, and they make it to retirement with some money left.

Making them sign away control of their money sounds like a new version of the old story of infantilizing black people by removing their adult rights, "for their own good".

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Seems pretty anecdotal. Hockey tends to get less press in general than baseball, so I know of a lot more broke white baseball players than broke white hockey players. There's some broke white golfers out there too, that's another money-requiring sport.

Any broke Formula 1 race drivers or tennis players? That's where you'd really look for athletes coming from wealthy families, I think.

In Canada it's different - our sports press is all hockey, all the time. Granted I don't pay much attention to it, but if any sports news makes it to my news feed, it probably is going to be about atheletes going bankrupt.

Anecdotally, I majored in economics at a large public school with a (at the time) national championship caliber hockey team. All of the players on that team that made it to the NHL attended the same classes I did. Most did come from privileged backgrounds but at least one grew up in the projects of Toronto. The coach strongly encouraged his players to take at least a few classes that would give them some financial grounding.

Could be an exception to the rule, but the highest profile athlete bankruptcy recently is from a hockey player

http://ftw.usatoday.com/2016/11/columbus-blue-jackets-jack-j...

That was a bit of a different story since his parents took out loans in his name.

They do exist: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_black_NHL_players

To this Making them sign away control of their money sounds like a new version of the old story of infantilizing black people by removing their adult rights, "for their own good". Yes, that's certainly a dimension. And it works in Australia too, where aboriginal workers had their cash both sequestrated and then stolen.

In my defence, weak though it is, there was no moment I actually intended to refer to specifically black sportspeople. If more black people in sports in America are financially uneducated, the bias in outcome would be there. I am pretty sure immature spending behaviour is colourblind and in all seriousness I meant this across race and culture: I think huge cash incentives for young people should be constrained to last. I'm not a libertarian.

Really, taking their adult autonomy away is the first step? How about education?

When do you educate somebody about how to control millions of dollars of assets, in the moment of giving them autonomy over them? If you want to propose education, then its rational to propose the control over the money before and during education is there, no? or, do you propose letting them blow the million on drugs and sex, and then teach them how to sustainably hold onto it, when all they have is a debt hole?

That’s a unique spin. It’s not about infantilizing. Hockey players also make a lot less, with fewer big payouts and thus fewer big flameouts.

Personally, I think the unions should help guide these guys. New money leading to bankruptcy is a universal story, not unique to any race.

Athletes are particularly vulnerable to scammers, as they spend a lot of time isolated by coaches with a small group of people. Self dealing trusted advisors and that isolation makes them vulnerable.

Hockey players make more than football players.

And the average NHL career is only a few years like the NFL.

I would consider a much less drastic step.

Mandatory contribution of 10% of their income into an investment account and that has a maximum annual withdrawal of 1% until age 55.

If they otherwise destroy their finances, they'll at least be able to afford a place to live.

In Canada we have the CPP (Canada Pension Plan) which is almost literally this, except everyone pays into it.

In the US, we have Social Security and everyone pays into that but for the most part, you can't collect anything on the benefits until you reach retirement age or become permanently disabled.

Not a bad idea. Here in Australia we call that superannuation. 9% of salary is mandatory.

I'm curious as to how hockey is any more expensive than any other sport that has player equipment and a privileged background is more beneficial to making it to the professional level than any other sport.

Could it be that black kids as a group just isn't that interested in playing hockey?

Skates are more expensive than cleats. Hockey sticks break or are grown out of, and decent ones are a few hundred bucks.

A quick look at Google shopping disagrees with shoes vs skates and hockey sticks. Although I'm not up to speed at what qualifies as a decent hockey stick and the required cost.

There are inexpensive youth and junior skates (<$100), but these are for younger kids. As soon as you are wearing adult sized skates (10-12yrs old), the price is many times that of cleats.

https://www.purehockey.com/c/ice-hockey-skates-senior

Ah, you provided examples unlike the other comment I responded to. Thank you for that.

But if priced low-to-high the senior skates on that site start at $64.99 and go up from there. Assuming that the lower cost skates are not worth it, you get what you pay for and all that, what's wrong with the middle tier skates that are in the $100-$200 range? How long do they last once a kid's foot doesn't outgrow it every 3-to-6 months?

A decent pair of hockey skates are $300+. You also have to take them in to get sharpened every week if you are that aggressive on them. This is $60/mth.

You also have to invest in padding, helmets, gloves, socks, and so on.

What defines a "decent pair" of skates and why do they cost $300? Wouldn't a nice pair off the shelf at less than $100 or around $50 suffice for a young kid just wanting to play hockey?

I didn't consider the maintenance aspect; the need for sharpening makes sense though.

Good skates can be baked and molded to their feet.

Cheap skates are like cheap running shoes. Yeah, they get the job done until the ill-fitted skates don't offer proper fit and support. Your kid is fine for a month, then they have welts from the cheap insoles and twisted ankles from no stability.

Just wanting to skate at the rink is one thing, practicing and chasing pucks on top of learning edge control demands proper equipment.

Especially given that it's Black History month, it sounds like you might be interested in watching this movie:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soul_on_Ice_(film)

And consider this criticism of the somewhat rosier picture portrayed in that film:

https://hockeyinsociety.com/2017/03/06/soul-on-ice-the-day-t...

That criticism seems to conflate culture with skin. The NHL has a culture where bring the spotlight on individuals is frowned upon (For a long time having a high number on you sweater was considered showboaty). The article wants to call this "white culture" that is unwelcoming to people of colour. That seems wrong to me.

Ice is more expensive than fields, but there is probably a feedback loop as well.

Just about every high school has a football team, equipment is often paid for via fundraisers/carwashes etc if it's not in the budget. Hockey is generally not a high school sport, young people have to pay to participate and do so completely on their own time outside of school.

So it's just as possible as football, but the locals decide to not offer hockey in the same way? What if predominately black high schools in large cities started demanding hockey teams?

The expenses are high and the exceptional players start very young.

Football can be played/practiced on any large grass field in any climate any time of the year. Hockey requires an indoor facility with expensive chilling and maintenance equipment if you want to play outside of a few northern cities for a few months out of the year. Inner city Houston kids will never have access to hockey facilities in any significant numbers.

Do inner city schools play basketball outside? Although, I can see maintaining a hockey rink has increased costs over a basketball court.

In most of the US you can't even practice ice skating without paying money. Compare that to the number of basketball courts out there for pickup games, or fields where football could be played. It's not solely that the equipment costs more, it's that practice directly requires money, and practice time is the biggest overall driver of excellence. Professional race driving is another example of this. Tennis another notable one.

If you want a direct non-racial example of this: white hockey player origin distribution, Canadian and Scandinavian-born versus US-born. Guess where the ice is? :)

Baseball is another sport where black participation has declined in the US and the general assumption is that it's similarly because it's harder to find places to practice baseball in modern American cities (while still much more common in Latin America). Hence http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/official_info/mlb_official_story_head...

So the problem is lack of ice and not directly related to economic status? If one goes far enough north, or south, where ice is easily found for practice then the costs decline? So it's more where people choose to live versus the cost of the sport as a whole?

http://time.com/4913284/kids-sports-cost/

Organized youth sports are expensive (in the US at least), and hockey more so than others. You need a lot of equipment which your kid will keep growing out of, and then costs for ice time. Ice time is likely less expensive in big hockey regions (I have no idea), but it's always a cost. A competitive youth league team isn't practicing on a frozen lake.

So, sticks and skates as more equipment than football.

Although, someone pointed out elsewhere that good skates can be expensive and requires maintenance. I didn't consider costs of keeping skates sharp. But I'm still curious as to why high-quality expensive equipment is required specifically for hockey when it seems to me that every other sport has a large number of kids with substandard equipment. Do hockey players not use hand-me-downs or used equipment?

> So the problem is lack of ice and not directly related to economic status? If one goes far enough north, or south, where ice is easily found for practice then the costs decline? So it's more where people choose to live versus the cost of the sport as a whole?

Minors don’t choose where their parents live. If you’re getting drafted at 19 yrs of age, you’ve probably been playing since you were a kid. If you don’t live in a region with abundant natural ice, it will cost you money to skate.

Frankly, your comments comes across as the same type of empty criticism as that which often comes up when people complain about government: “If it’s really so bad, why don’t you just move to another country?” Easier to blame someone for where they live than to consider the challenges of relocating. Both criticisms are deliberately dim.

No, I'm just asking questions trying to understand how it is that hockey is apparently the most expensive sport for kids and only the highly privileged kids get to play.

I don't understand all this negativity I'm getting by just asking questions. A person couldn't possibly propose a solution to a problem without asking questions first.

What?? What point are you even trying to make, now? "More black people would play hockey if more slaves had been imported to Canada and Scandinavia"? Sure, probably, but that's now a completely irrelevant hypothetical to the posed question of "is there a economic background connection to the likelihood of bankruptcy after exposure to extreme short-lived income streams?"

Um, I think I said nothing of the kind. I believe you need to reconsider how you approach different topics. People are free to move about these days you know.

Why in the world is someone downvoting me for asking questions?

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