The price of concert tickets have nearly doubled in the past 30 years, but is all of the money going to the artists? Not necessarily. If not, then why are you paying hundreds of dollars for one concert ticket?  

COVID shut down all concerts across the world, cutting off the main source of income for the majority of artists. As soon as it was safe again, all artists had to make up for lost time and money by booking as many gigs as possible. Most venues have to sell out 80% of the venue to make back their money. However, with such a high demand for venues, it allowed the vendors to raise the prices. Artists also had to deal with post-covid inflation which resulted in higher prices.  

The transition from CD’s to streaming platforms is a big cause for the need of higher ticket prices. During the 80’s-90’s in order to listen to music from your favorite artists you had to buy a CD where the profit goes to the artist. Now with the touch of one button, you can be listening to anyone at any time for free. The artists still make money from the amount of plays they get, but this does not match up to the reliable income from selling CD’s. 

A big one is the fees from ticketsellers, specifically ticketmaster. 85% of the prices that you pay goes to the artists. So, where does the other 15% go? All of them are fees that are paid straight to ticketmaster. In some cases the fees that are added on top can cost more than the ticket value itself. After the “great war” to get Taylor Swift tickets , fans are now questioning the reliability of some of these companies, only making ticket sales harder for the artists. 

Uncontrolled by the artists, but bound to happen: markups. Markups for tickets are reaching new heights as they are being resold for hundreds more than their original value. Take Taylor Swift for example. These tickets are nearly impossible to find and if you are lucky enough to find some, what originally would have been $99 is now selling for over $1000. 

These ticket prices don’t scare off everyone, especially when it comes to seeing your favorite artist perform. People would pay unreasonable amounts for tickets “because I would feel the need to go if I knew I could still buy tickets”, Clara Woodham expressed. Students feel that the reason for this uproar is “probably how many people want to go to concerts, it’s like a supply and demand situation.” explained Laila Kenney. 

At the end of the day, concert ticket prices are only going to keep going up. The real question is how much is too much? 

https://yonamariemusic.com/yona/blog/403/why-are-concert-tickets-so-expensive-6-reasons 

https://scrippsnews.com/stories/why-did-concert-tickets-get-so-expensive/ 

https://countryconcert.com/