Scalping Subsidised Commonwealth Games Tickets

The anti-scalping laws for Commonwealth Games tickets suggests there is a thriving demand at above face-value prices. Yet the taxpayer subsidy on each ticket is probably between $500 and $800. In other words, laws were passed to stop people paying the fair price of the tickets! Surely this means the State Government - and Chairman Ron Walker - have botched the pricing?

No doubt their defenders would cry "affordability". Well, if they wanted to make the Games affordable for people on low-incomes then means-testing would have targeted these families. But I suspect many families would rather have kept the hundreds of dollars as cash rather than as cheaper tickets. Instead, the Victorian Government has ingeniously put families in the position of having to buy tickets to get their own money back. This bolsters attendance figures, which will be used to justify the whole endeavour. Pyramid marketing scammers would be proud!