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Every woman (on average) needs to have 2.1 children to maintain a society. Women have the children. No society in history has experienced economic growth with a decline in human capital. Something needs to be done or our society will be replaced or die out.
Lowering taxes on men via reducing the welfare state would allow more take-home pay and more money to spend on motocross. This would surely grow the sport.
Then you have prices, although the bike is a one time cost every few years it's still lots higher than a few years ago, but way way higher than in the eighties or whatever. Then gas, $4 or more a gallon for super in the bike or $15 a gallon for race fuel. My oil is $18 a quart, tires are $130 a piece, filter oil is $13 etc etc. Not to mention gear, $600 boots that last me a season, same with my helmet. Pants that are $300 and barely last me 6 months. Practice is $30 and a race day is $100 or more because I only race the bigger events. I'm lucky and make way more than the average but sometimes I just say fuck it I'm riding my MTB instead, less stress.
Back in the day I had the money and the time to ride three days a week. That for me is alot harder to do nowadays. If you have a kid or two then almost double or triple all that. I don't think wages have kept up with inflation, actually it is well proven that they haven't, not even close. Not as many normal people can afford it. Much less average family's.
Just my take on it from my small part of the country. But never mind I got sucked into this old ass thread, I thought it looked familiar. I need to change my contacts maybe we can tax that?
The Shop
1. Lack of places for beginners to ride. Back in the day you could practice riding in vacant areas without getting trouble but today people call cops as soon as they see dirt bike ridden n anywhere else than on a official riding area. When I was a kid we used to ride every day with my friends after school at local sand pits with out any parent guidance. Today you need your parents to take you on the motocross track located middle of nowhere and pay track fee to being able to ride ...
2. Digitalization. Many of today's kids are only interested in Iphones and Ipads... Loud and smelly dirt bikes aren't cool thing anymore among teens. Many parents seem to think that it's safer to let they kids live in virtual world rather than in the real world outside
3. Everything cost more. Bikes, gas, track fees, insurance etc. cots more than they did in the 90's. Especially high insurance prices here in Finland are really killing the sport
4.Tracks are becoming more and more demanding for beginners to ride. The jumps are almost twice as big than they where back in 90's and Supercross style risk and reward obstacles are common in almost every outdoor track. This has been increasing injury rate caused insurance fees to go up
5. Four stroke bikes. Say what you want but nobody can denied the fact that introducing four strokes to motocross did hurt the sport. Four stroke sound carries lot further has lead closing a lot of riding areas. Bikes cost more to buy and are more expensive and difficult to rebuild. When I was 15 years old I could already rebuild my KX125 engine by myself in my own garage but even today I haven't got the skills and tools to rebuild modern four stroke race engine myself. When I read the bike builds section here in Vital there aren't many guys here in Vital either who can do full rebuild on a four stroke engine by themselves. This has lead to huge problem in used four stroke bike market. Just in couple of years four stroke bike will lose half of its value due to expensive maintenance and nobody want's to buy one. In the other hand older two stroke prices have been going up
6. Today's demanding work environment. You are expected to be committed your work almost 24/7 do long work days. If do don't agree to that there is always next one who will. That doesn't leave much free time to be spent with dirt bikes. Salaries haven't increased much in last decade but the cost of living has increased so there is less money to spent on dirt biking
7. Elitism inside the sport. If you don't have the latest bike, gear and new Sprinter van in the pits you are nobody
Most of the guys I use to ride with either did not have kids and the ones that did (me included) the kids just don't really care to do it.
Who would have thunk it?
Just imagine how many little mxers we will have in the future if nothing changes. And combine this with all the Boomers, Gen Xers, and Gen. Yers that will leave the sport due to age or cost.
The times, they are a changin'.
Imo the last 50 yrs maybe more, have been shaped by greed.
Can it change sure, will it? i hope so, when, no clue?
Imo riding a track and Motocross is awsome. but riding or watching at a local level with 10 or less on the gate is not the same either.
I would rather get 15th place out of 40 than 2nd out of 5
Moto will decline with stick and ball sports, family dinner and sex with humans.
You get so much more ride time, & you don’t have to wait 2 to 3 hrs to go ride 1 Moto of aprox 10 min then wait another couple hrs
I think a Good solution would be more langtown type tracks
Small could be built on a couple acres, Rather than a neighborhood, i was always surprised that didnt catch on
On a larger scale,
the bikes were custom but if the demand was there im sure factories could easily build a 150 air cooled 4 stroke in 85cc type frames with more and Better suspension than the trail bikes, basically 150cc air cooled
Race bikes, which seems perfect because they are Torquey
Not too to loud and seem very low maintenance and Reliable,
Looks super fun and not to dangerous.
Motocross is extremely dependent on economics and demographics.
The decisions women have made have severely impacted economics and demographics.
Women going to college and entering the job market flooded the job market and lowered wages for everyone. Lower wages hurt an expensive sport like motocross that has gotten more expensive with four-strokes and such.
Women deciding to delay marriage, having less kids via birth control and abortion, waiting too long to naturally have any kids, and utilizing the welfare state as an alternative to marriage has affected demographics. Motocross needs a significant supply of young people (specifically males) from intact families to get into the sport and continue to participate into teenage years and adulthood. If these males are never born in the first place or raised by single mothers, there will be less supply of new moto recruits. If there are not enough workers to support the welfare state, taxes will need to be raised, hurting recreational spending.
Women embrace hypergamy, which lowers marriage and birth rates. This can lead to a demographic death spiral. Gen. Y may end up being generation spinster. How many spinsters are taking little Johnny to go buy a PW50? Zero.
Women are the majority of voters, and the voters have not done nearly enough to elect politicians willing to enforce immigration policies as well as immigration labor policies. All voters are to blame, but women tend to vote Democrat who has worse policies regarding immigration. Clinton and NAFTA is a perfect example. Immigration floods labor markets and depresses wages. If one works in a market with depressed wages they will likely not be able to afford to particiapte in motocross.
If one understands cause and effect, they have to agree that the decisions women have made have affected motocross and society. And we will be seeing the effects of these decisions in the near future. And dare I say they will not be good.
If marriage and birth rates continue to plunge where will the next generation of motocrossers come from? Will we be able to replace all the former motocrossers who have left and will leave the sport? Are we looking at a 50% reduction in the sport in the next 20 years? How will the industry and sport survive?
Pit Row
I am sure to be flamed, but...
There are 330 million people in the United States and over 7 billion worldwide. If we can’t grow the sport we have no one other than ourselves to blame. Man up and accept responsibility for your own short coming; women making an income isn’t why your dumbass couldn’t figure out how to make dirtbiking more popular.
The moto industry has been doing a decent enough job of hiding just how bad things are dollar wise, thus the reason why you aren't sure about a decline.
However... it is. People aren't jumping off roofs.... yet. If the next 24 months stay the same or improve, MX/SX will make it another decade. But if the numbers keep doing what they are..............................................
In The Netherlands the sport seems popular. But with a 4 time world champ thats no surprise
Entrys are way down , there do seem to be some areas where it is still good though, i always here new Jersey
E-town, some parts of new york and some parts of Illinois
Still get big turn outs, and so cal i think is at least at some tracks, but most states its way down.
I think all the reasons are pretty well covered in this thread,
#1 Being money imo
But its not the only reason
I dont think its lack of kids being born though lol.
Just because there are a lot of people in the USA and the world does not ensure that the sport will grow. The sport is dependent upon the target demographic and their economic ability to participate.
If the target demograpic is affected by depressed wages, flooded labor markets, divorce (70% initiated by women), lack of births (for a variety of reasons), as well as a sport that increased in price, mathamatically less will participate. And thus the death spiral.
The blame of four-strokes and kids playing on devices is only part of the problem.
Thats where the subject gets interesting, and makes me think there are still things that could be done to increase participation.
I've watched my sons (who both like bikes and cars....) playing XBox and Playstation on some of the car games, and I swear the players think its all real, arguing about whose car is better, who the better driver is etc.
I just don't see the interest in younger people these days.
JMHO
Dave
I know the kids like video games, ipads etc but i think they would still ride at least 50% of boys 12 and under imo
I feel they arent being given the opportunity, due to other reasons cost, lack of riding area's etc. And then sort of a snowball effect of less doing thsn less others seeing or hearing about it etc.
The haves have nots thing, one side has all those things and the lower have none of those things.
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