Comment by kjkjadksj
2 days ago
From what I observed about these club hockey players I saw growing up, mainly the kid loves it and made it into their identity. So the parents are probably feeling pretty forced into paying for it. That being said every family I knew doing this sort of thing could easily pay for it.
Often the kids do enjoy it, but I see a lot of essentially "pay to play" - your 10-yr-old playing tier 8 basketball shouldn't be going to out of town tournaments regularly, but club & private is big business and they push an NBA experience of travel, tourneys and gear - with the associated costs.
I mean aren't there also jockeying for college opportunities through school athleticism, and also a culture of over-competitive parents using their children's sports to posture against one another?