I brought it up in chatter, and I'll bring it up here...if you use an inflation calculator, the current pricing of tickets really isn't that far off from what it's been over the years...even when going back to the days of ticket booklets and factoring in how much you'd actually ride/experience during a day. Disney has NEVER been a cheap experience and the ticket price increases don't appear to be that far off from overall costs climbing in the US. The reality is that just about everything in your lives is climbing in price. Just look at the things you buy while grocery shopping and see how much your weekly spending goes up over the course of the year because of these gradual increases or how much you've had to cut from weekly/monthly spending to stay in budget. People are so quick to blame those raising the prices, but maybe the blame needs to go back to employers not being able to give employees meaningful cost of living increases to keep up. i.e. if Disney's increases are fairly in line with inflation and surge pricing is the common practice in most industries and is the no-brainer ticketing approach...maybe the fault lies someplace other than Disney.
I think the key issue that I took from the rant is looking at what you're currently getting for the price of that ticket. I don't mind spending the $ if I'm getting the kind of experience I have come to expect from the Disney parks. However, when I start getting a lesser experience for more $, I start debating about other vacation options.
I don't know what inflation calculator you're using, but the numbers I'm getting show that Disney is WAY above the inflation rate with their prices. For reference, this is the
calculator I'm using. This is the site I'm using for
historical Disney ticket prices.
I went back to 1999 - all 4 parks were open, they just re-structured the tickets. Tickets were all access tickets as they are now (not ticket books).
An adult 4 day PH pass in 1999 was 163.00 (at its cheapest). That $163 would equal $231.80 in 2016. A current adult 4 day park hopper is $394 (according to the WDW website). That's a 40% increase *over* what just the inflation increase would be.
Even just going back to the 2005 introduction of Magic Your Way tickets -
an adult 4 day base ticket cost $185. That $185 would equal $224.82 in 2016. Current 4 day base tickets cost $325. That's a 30% increase over what the inflation-alone increase would be.
Even just back in 2012, an adult 4 day base ticket (cheapest through disney) was $243. That $243 would equal $250.75 in 2016. Current 4 day base are $325. That's a 22% increase over what inflation alone would be.
Yes, that's 4 day tickets only...I didn't go back and calculate the differences for every type of ticket (have an appt to get to soon
). And as I said before, I understand that Disney is a business and don't expect them to be a charity at all. But I don't see how these numbers can show that the current pricing isn't that far off from what it's been over the years adjusting for inflation. The increases are quite a bit above just the inflation increase..
