Matt,If they changed the tax code do you really think a club like Augusta would sell tee times? If they did at $1000 a head they would sell out. Then you would just criticize them for only being only available to the rich……
I mean, yes, some would remain private for the sake of being private. I'm not sure what your argument is there? Augusta is already a for-profit corporation and not actually inhibited by the tax laws I'm talking about at all.
Let's be honest, Scotland has some private courses (Loch Lomond, Skibo, Renaissance), but the point is that they are few and far between. The reason why they are few and far between, is simply that many clubs would rather remain small
clubs rather than grow their ranks for the sake of revenues. This means offering visitor tee times occasionally. The number of clubs that would have opened up their courses visitor play during the pandemic, for example, would have been enormous, as I personally know some folks that join up with a prestigious club in my area exactly because they needed members during the pandemic, and the club would have been otherwise inaccessible to them. When these major events happen, it normalizes the idea of limited visitor play, and once it's normalized, it's very difficult to justify undoing it (just ask the folks at Pasatiempo selling afternoon-only tee times for nearly $400 per round, even at twilight).
My point is where you look at areas where you're
allowed to sell times to visitors, you tend to see most private clubs hosting visitors on a fairly regular, but very limited basis. That generates revenues for the club, and revenues for the state when they pay taxes on that income. Everyone wins.
Again, I'm not saying force the gates open with a crowbar or anything, I'm just saying we just make it actually legal for private clubs to tell visitors they can come play on a limited basis...
if they want to. Everyone in these threads keeps telling me it's dumb because they wouldn't open up, and I keep saying, okay, cool, so lets still do it in case you're wrong. Literally nothing changes if we change the laws and I'm wrong, but everything about golf access changes if the laws change and I'm right.
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As for the second half of your statement, you obviously don't know me very well. There are lots of people who will criticize the high prices of resorts like Pebble, but I'm not one of them. While extremely expensive, it's perfectly reasonable for even someone of modest means to save up to play Pebble or even Shadow Creek if they really want to.