Where your USTA membership fee went

[JRstriker12]

Originally Posted by vandre

yeah, sorry for the nonsequetion (i dunno if that's a word, but i like it). i was thinking of info in my head that i didn't post so that's kinda why it didn't make sense i guess.

i crashed a usta section meeting/ cabal/ whatever they're called. they were talking about ways to get more innercity youth invovled in tennis. their solution was to pass out one pass to the high priced racquetclub that the kid would have to get a ride to (or drive if the kid could drive and has a car). i butted heads with them saying you'd get more than one kid to pick up the game if you would repair these neighborhood courts (which they could walk or bike to) a little instead of trying to subsidize the private racquet club that doesn't need any help to make fat bank. needless to say, that was the last usta meeting i went to.

it seems like if they were serious about getting innercity youth involved in tennis, they would get more mileage out of patching and putting new nets on the neighborhood courts (which is all most of them need) than passing out a single pass to one youth who might not even be able to get to the daggone racquetclub and sure as sunshine would never be welcomed there!

as for the tax dollars, man, i've tried that before. my wife and i own a house and we paid in excess of $500 to the park district this past year and we plan on that going up next year. on top of that, the park district wants to charge me around $80 for a summer to play on the only decent courts in town (i'll never forget the look on that poor high school kid's face when i told him what i thought of the park district ) so what i'm saying is that the "i pay taxes" line doesn't even get me onto the tennis courts that don't need repaired so i don't think it will cover the ones that do.

I'm not against inter-city outreach, but yeah, it has to be done in the right way. A lot of sporting operations work on this "unfound talent in the Ghetto" myth... honestly, no public tennis program is going to produce a pro player without tons of coaching and support.

Bummer about the local gov screwing you over on the courts. Sounds like they either want a new line of revenue or they feel that there aren;t enough people who use the courts to make repairs worth while. I did some searching around and USTA does offer grants for court maintenance and repair, but there are conditions for the award. I found the story of one court that got two grants from the USTA for a total of about $65,000 - but that was really small change as more than about $90,000 came from fund raising and private contributions, and another large chunk of change came from local gov.

You can check out some of the program results here: http://thebigserve.usta.com/stories/

Seems like a lot of these courts also support some sort of youth programs and teaching in additon to just being park facilities.
Bummer...

[vandre]

thanks man! i'll look into that!

you're right, there's a ton of work and coaching that goes into a pro player, but there could be some kids that play in jrs and even work their way up to being college players. heck, if there are some kids (any kids) that took up the game and liked it so much they played it for the rest of there lives, i'd take that!

thanks again for the link!

[BreakPoint]

Originally Posted by PatrickB

But the issue is how much benefit you get from a CEO for the cost you pay. I'm not convinced that the marginal benefit you get from hiring a $5,000,000/yr CEO (or football coach) instead of a $500,000/yr one is worth it in most cases.

But you're not the one that these CEO's or football coaches need to convince. They only need to convince the board of directors or whomever is in charge of making the hiring decision.

For example, is a CEO worth $10 million a year if he increased the market value of the company by $140 billion in the past 5 years?

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/5-CEOs...od=career-work

[Tim Tennis]

Originally Posted by sureshs

There was an article in the WSJ last week which was an opinion that executive bonuses and stock options be abolished alltogether. If they wanted to profit from the company's success, let them spend their own money and buy shares, like any other shareholder. As far as the argument that then the best people will go elsewhere, it is a valid one. But they will have nowhere to go if all firms implement this. The advantage is that only executives interested in the long-term good of the company, which involves customers, employees, vendors, shareholders and the community at large, will ask for these positions. Right now, short-term gains are what they are rewarded for by bonuses, and so short-term gains are what they pursue. They layoff people at the slightest pretext, try to cheat the government, do the minimal environmental thing they can get away with, etc etc.

I agree with you. The one thing I take exception to is your statement, "As far as the argument that then the best people will go elsewhere, it is a valid one." They want you to believe this threat but think a little deeper. If the CEO is making $9 mil and they want to cut his pay to $1 mil., poor guy, is another firm going to fire their $1 mil. guy doing as far as they know a pretty good job and give it to a another guy and pay him $9 mil? I don't think so. Also remember this 1 mil guy already has his board in his pocket.

Wow, $9,000,000 a year. That is ridiculous. There should be strict limits on executive compensation on any charitable or non profit organization. Bonuses, bonuses for what, doing your job. Your bonus is you get to keep your job if you meet the expectations. Like the rest of the employees.

The problem is the good old boy network.. Who approves these salaries? Some kind of board, give me a break they are all in bed together. You scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours. That is the problem with corporate America.. It is the fox keeping guard over the hen house. How do you think you get to be a member of the board? You are a team player. The system is broke.

Greed, greed, greed. It is like Bill Clinton, “I did it cause I could.” Here are some numbers to think about in 1970 the ratio of hourly pay to CEO’s was 1 to 45, now is up to 1 to 1400 what is wrong with this picture? Note: Not exact but close. I came across them a few days ago.

Here is some food for thought if a sprinter can run the 100 meters in 10 sec., and you pay him $100,000. Will he be able to run the 100 meters in 5 sec., if you pay him $200,000. I don’t think so. Yet the executives would like the have you believe the more you pay them the better job they will be able to do. It is amazing how many people buy into this.

I think anyone who volunteers for the USTA should quit. Oh that is right they will get their name in the magazine if they get voted the volunteer of the year, yippy skippy.

Best regards,

Ed
Tennis Geometrics

http://www.tennisgeometrics.com

[sureshs]

Originally Posted by Tim Tennis

I think anyone who volunteers for the USTA should quit.

I agree with that. The USTA is a quasi-government organization which receives government money. They should not give such obscene bonuses. I have long felt that "volunteerism" (promoted vigorously by all politicians to make people feel good) is not as beneficial as it is thought to be. In this case, the excess money from the CEO pay should have been spent to pay people for part-time work. In other cases, volunteerism hides the real intentions of the big players. A company which sponsors some activity related to volunteers may actually be using the publicity to shield itself against the environmental damage it is doing. A politician bent on cutting education funds will happily promote parent volunteers. There are so many naive people going around cleaning beaches and so on while being clueless how the real damage is inflicted and what they can do about it politically.