Have You Been Priced Out of a Hobby?
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From GQED in San Francisco, I'm Nina Kim. Coming up on Forum, you've probably noticed that common hobbies from sewing to skiing have gotten more expensive. It's a dynamic that Atlantic staff writer Tyler Austin Harper calls hobby inflation. And it not only affects your pocketbook, but also means fewer opportunities for personal fulfillment or community building. Have you ever been priced out of a hobby? Or what's an activity you'd be hard-pressed to give up, no matter the cost?

We take a closer look this hour at what we lose when we can no longer afford our hobbies, right after this news. Welcome to Forum. I'm Mina Kim.

Hobbies are not essential by definition, but their value and impact go beyond the sprinkle of personal joy they bring to our lives, which in itself is important. And for a while now, hobbies have been getting more expensive, with tariffs the latest threat to the affordability of many activities we do to come down from the stressors of daily life.

So this hour, we take a moment to consider the role hobbies play in our lives and what we lose when we can no longer afford them. Listeners, what makes you invest in a hobby? And have you ever been priced out of one? You can tell us by calling 866-733-6786.

by emailing forum at kqed.org. Or finding us on our social channels on Blue Sky, Facebook, Instagram, and threads at kqedforum. Joining me now is Tyler Austin Harper, a staff writer for The Atlantic and also co-host of the Time to Say Goodbye podcast. Tyler, welcome to Forum. Thank you so much. Happy to be here. Yeah, thanks for doing the article that inspired today's show. So you've described yourself as a hobby-oriented person. So what are your hobbies?

I have a variety. I think most seriously, I fish pretty obsessively. I fish probably anywhere from 70 to 80 nights a year. I also shoot with a fair degree of frequency. I used to be a big bourbon collector, but not so much any longer. But right now, my main recreational pursuit has been for a long time is definitely fishing. So you have dialed back on shooting, it sounded like, just then? Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I still, you know, shoot much more than the average person, but it's gotten increasingly expensive over the last few years. The variety of shooting I do is definitely decreased because of increasing ammunition prices. And now with tariffs impacting the fishing industry pretty, pretty hard and driving up the price of tackle because so much fishing equipment's made in China, I've sort of, you know, had to pick between shooting as much as I want

and doing as much fishing stuff as I want. And the fishing wins in that competition. So yeah, dialing back some of the other things a bit. Yeah. So how did you get into shooting?

You know, I my dad was a state cop growing up. So, you know, I grew up in a hunting family and around guns and I got a shotgun for my 10th or 11th birthday and discovered that there was a gun range nearby to do sporting clays, clay pigeon shooting. And so, you know, I had my mom drive me over one afternoon and, you know, I was like, I'm going to do this.

you know, gave it a try and was sort of immediately hooked. And it's been something I've been, you know, interested in ever since. I worked at the very same gun club throughout high school as my sort of high school job and lost track of sporting clays a bit through my college years and especially after moving to New York City. But still something I do every once in a while, but, you know, do other kinds of shooting as well, as mentioned. Yeah. Can you give me a sense of how the costs have gone up with shooting?

Yeah, so I first started shooting seriously sporting clays around 2006. Around 2006, you could get a box of shotgun shells for a box of 25 for about, you know, four bucks, five dollars at a push.

And a case, which is 250 rounds, would run $35, $40. You could get it even cheaper on sale. And now, for example, those have doubled in cost. So even cheap target shells, you're looking at $10 a box, and cases can very easily climb to $80, $90, $100, up to $150 for really nice ammunition like you might use for target shooting. So in the span of a little over a decade, it's basically doubled in price.

Well, we have listeners weighing in with hobbies that have gotten pricier. Steve on Discord writes, I got priced out of photography. Cost to develop and print became unsustainable. I moved to digital photography when the cost hit my breakpoint. Digital photography turns out to be a different sort of money pit. Modern cameras are fundamentally computers and they have a roughly two-year life cycle before the next hotness arrives. Back in the film era, many photographers would use the same camera for a decade.

I have worn out four DSLR cameras in less than 20 years. So Tyler, what's driving hobby inflation, do you think? And how is it different from regular inflation?

Yeah. So in terms of I'll answer the last question first. You know, I see hobby inflation is distinct from from regular inflation, because what I mean by hobby inflation is increasing price of hobbies that is out of keeping with just regular background inflation. Right. So like the cost of general goods has not doubled since 2006. Right. But the cost of shooting is very much higher.

doubled or more than doubled in that time period. So by hobby inflation, I mean inflation of hobbies that is out of keeping with the inflation of the rest of the economy. Now, the causes of hobby inflation, I think one of the things that's interesting about it, it's really multi-causal. I think it's something that you can see across a wide variety of leisure pursuits,

but the causes are often distinct in each case. I'm given to understand one of the reasons why ammunition started becoming much more expensive about a decade ago was increased lead demand from China as their, you know, computing sector had, had more lead demand. It led to sort of, um,

more global shortages of lead and increasing prices, et cetera. I'm not a knitter, but I know people who knit who have said knitting raw materials have gotten more expensive due to various supply constraints in that industry. With fishing, like I said,

Part of the problem is a lot of stuff is made in China and lately that's getting squeezed by tariffs. So there is no, no one cause, which is again, you know, something I think that's interesting about this problem, but really does seem to be across the board, a wide variety of hobbies. And, you know, some of it too is just post pandemic. A lot of hobbies that used to be more obscure, particularly in the, you know, the social media era when we were all locked inside on our phones, scrolling Instagram. A lot of those hobbies really took off in popularity as well, which I think is,

is causing some supply-demand issues that have driven up prices in many cases. Yeah. So it's widespread. And I guess regardless why, one of the things that really struck you is it must have a huge impact on accessibility. Is there something along the lines of if you're an upper-middle-class person who is feeling the squeeze, then how must middle- or working-class people be feeling it?

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I think that's, you know, one of the main issues here is that the result of hobby inflation will be the sort of socioeconomic homogenization of different leisure activities, right? If only wealthy or at least, you know, firmly middle class people can afford to do them. Hobbies that might have previously been pretty economically diverse suddenly look much more economically homogenous, you know. And so, yeah, I think that's certainly an accessibility problem. And I think it poses other sorts of issues as well.

What are some of the things that you've noticed as losses or have become harder to come by as you've given up a hobby like bourbon collecting or dialed it back like shooting?

Yeah, you know, one thing I think is important to underscore is that when you dial back on a hobby, you know, hobbies are sort of most of them involve pretty thick social networks. They're often infrastructure intensive in the sense that you have to go to a place in order to do them, a place that often has other people doing the same thing. They often can center around clubs or other kinds of, you know, what sociologists would call third spaces.

And so when you dial back on a hobby or quit it outright, you're not just ceasing to do a particular kind of activity, but you are also withdrawing from from an entire social world, really. So the decision to shoot less, for example, is not just a decision to, you know, spend less time in the range and spend less money on ammunition. It's also a decision about there are certain people I'm probably not going to see anymore as much anymore because, you know, those are the kind of people I do that particular activity with.

Or there are certain places, you know, that have a certain community that I might not be involved in as much anymore because I'm dialing back. So, you know, there isn't just it's not just a loss of leisure pursuits that result from hobby inflation, but it's also withdrawal from different kinds of social networks, which, you know, has a personal cost. I think it can have a political cost, et cetera.

Yeah, sort of, you know, draw that out for me a little bit with regard to what you see sort of in the future or the broader effect that it can have with regard to sort of the way that we engage and live our lives. You definitely ruminated on that in your piece.

Yeah, you know, I mean, I'll just use, I'll return to sporting clays as an example. You know, when I started shooting sporting clays, you know, when I was around 12 or so at the aforementioned gun club, you know, shooting was much more affordable then. There was a really interesting cross section of people that

shot regularly at that gun club. You know, there were very wealthy people that, you know, had tricked out golf carts to drive around the course. There were very low income people. There were military veterans. There were, you know, really conservative people, really liberal people. There was a whole sort of tableau of, you know, American social life from varieties of

you know, class stratas, religious backgrounds, racial backgrounds, et cetera. And, you know, when I've been to gun clubs more recently and when I've shot sporting plays more recently over the last 10 years, I've definitely noticed them becoming more homogenous, you know, becoming more of the sort of, you know, English tweed crowd on, on,

shooting on the weekends rather than the sort of, you know, broader, broader cross section of American life. So it's something you can see, I think, really acutely, particularly in some of these hobbies that have had really, really drastic inflation.

We are talking with Tyler Austin Harper, a staff writer for The Atlantic, who has written a piece recently for The Atlantic called What We Lose When We're Priced Out of Our Hobbies. And you, our listeners, are sharing whether you've had similar experiences. Is your hobby becoming less affordable or have you felt priced out of it?

What's a hobby you'd be hard-pressed to give up, no matter the cost, because it means so much to you? Tell us about the community you've built through your hobby. And I'm also curious if you're noticing that tariffs have already had an effect on

on the cost of your hobby. You can tell us by emailing forum at kqed.org, finding us on Blue Sky Facebook, Instagram, and threads at KQED Forum, or by calling us at 866-733-6786, 866-733-6786. Rick writes, I'm not being priced out of all of my hobbies, but I love electric model trains, and those are just way too expensive now, whether they're made in China or not.

Ariana on Blue Sky writes, one of my hobbies is freshwater aquarium fish. I already have my setup so I can keep things relatively cheap. I'm not worried about myself. I'm worried about my amazing local fish stores and specialty online businesses that help make my hobby a community. That's definitely a big part of this too, the ripple effect, right? Tyler, just with regard to

the businesses that source hobbies already being worried about their hobby that turned into a hustle becoming something that they can no longer afford to keep open or a store that they may have to close down. Are you hearing that? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think it's a real concern. You know, like I said, I fish a lot. I know a lot of people who, you know, I've written for some fishing magazines. I know a lot of people who work in that industry. It's definitely a real concern. It's a concern from manufacturers about, you know,

how demand is going to be impacted when price continues to soar. It's definitely a major concern for local tackle shops, for example. So it's a real issue. And I think that's one of the reasons why I wanted to write this article is I think there's a way in which we can be tempted to say, oh, knitting is getting more expensive or fishing is getting more expensive or bourbon collecting, which is certainly frivolous, is getting more expensive. But the

point I want to make is it's you know it's frivolous in one sense but in another sense it's really profoundly serious because these these are activities that often do hold together an entire social world you know more after the break I'm Mina Kim

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You're listening to Forum. I'm Mina Kim. We're talking about the rising cost of hobbies and what we lose when we have to give them up. We're talking about it with Tyler Austin Harper, staff writer at The Atlantic, and with you, our listeners. What's a hobby you've been priced out of or one that's becoming less affordable and you're worried that you may have to give up?

What's a hobby you'd be hard-pressed to give up, no matter the cost, because it means so much to you? Why? Tell us about the community you've built through your hobby. Have you noticed tariffs already having an effect on the cost of your hobby? Call us at 866-733-6786, email us at forum at kqed.org, or post on our social channels at KQED Forum. I want to bring into the conversation now Senior Platforms Engagement Producer for KQED, Jasmine Garnett. Jasmine, thanks so much for joining us.

Hi, thank you for having me. So I understand, Jasmine, that you have felt priced out of skiing. Tell me about that. Yeah, absolutely. I've been skiing for a few years. I wouldn't say I'm great. I'm just intermediate.

And I really enjoy it. But yeah, when I was looking at the price of ski passes for this year and I was calculating the costs of Airbnbs, travel, food, I just had to accept that this is probably something that I couldn't commit to with all the other financial obligations that I have.

Yeah, and I just decided that maybe one or two trips casually with friends is all that I can afford right now and come to terms with that decision. Yeah, you also sew and make clothes. That's something I know you are not giving up on, right? What do you love about doing that?

Yeah, what Tyler said resonated with me. It's something that I started to take more seriously during the pandemic. I started knitting and sewing. My mom taught me, so for a long time I was using her old machines and patterns and things like that. And yeah, I recently started spending more on that hobby because I figured that it was something that I'd been doing for a long time and I could see myself doing for a long time in the future.

Um, and yeah, I mean, it is really expensive to buy nice materials and like new sewing machines and things like that. But, um, it's something that felt more worth it to me in the long run than, yeah, a lot of money skiing when I'm only like average at skiing. Where have, or how have you navigated that it's getting more expensive or that it's expensive to do at the level that you want to do it?

I think that for a long time I was using secondhand machines like the sewing machine that I had used for like five years was a free machine that my mom found for me on Facebook Marketplace. I think sometimes when I wanted to experiment, I would find machines.

you know, fabric or yarn from estate sales or from eBay. And I still do that because I think there are so many craft materials that people sell or can't use. Yeah, so that's like a way that I would keep costs down initially. Yeah. And then what advice do you have for folks who are looking for ways of making a sewing hobby more affordable?

I would look at secondhand materials for sure. I mean, yeah, secondhand instruction books, if you don't want to take a class, are really great. I've found that, yeah, old textbooks are super helpful if you don't want to, you know, pay hundreds of dollars for a regular class. And yeah, again, going to estate sales and finding, you know, different kinds of fabric and different kinds of materials to experiment with. It sounds like there also has to be somewhat of an adjustment of a frame of mind too, in the sense that

I think a lot of people think making your own clothes might be less expensive than buying them. Yeah, that's absolutely not true. It can be just as expensive, if not more expensive. Yeah, there are lots of times where, yeah, the thing that I made ends up being so much more expensive than if I just bought it at the store. And then I have to accept that, you know, I paid that money to learn how to do something, not necessarily get like a perfect finished product.

And that's kind of a lot of the fun of the hobby to me is learning things and not necessarily having a perfect outcome. So are you a little bummed about the fact that you probably can't make skiing much more than like a once a year kind of thing? Like what is an aspect of it that you worry a little bit about giving up as a result of not doing it as often? Yeah, absolutely. I think that when I was learning and I was going a lot,

It was really fun to talk to other people who were skiing all the time and kind of commiserate. And, you know, there was a whole community that I was, you know, more involved with. And so, yeah, I'm going to really miss like the time spent, you know, driving up with friends or, you know,

being in the Airbnb or like doing logistics stuff, like that stuff is really fun to me. Um, not to mention, you know, like watching myself improve. Um, yeah. So I think that is like something that I have to accept. Yeah. Well, Jasmine, thanks so much for talking with us.

Thank you so much. Jasmine Garnett is Senior Platforms Engagement Producer for KQED. And you, our listeners, are sharing your experiences with the rising costs of hobbies. And let me go to caller Mark in Riverside. Hi, Mark. You're on. Hey, thank you for your time. Mine is golf. The majority of the clubs are made in Asia, along with the balls. And to have that hit

at home and clubs break and not be able to go out and buy a good set of clubs to maintain your level of play, it's crushing. I truly view golf as a therapeutic sport. It's a vacation away from the current environment we live in. Once you take away these hobbies,

because of obviously what's going on. Some people are leaping before they have worked. No names will be mentioned. But once you take away these hobbies, to me, it takes away quality of life. I mean, we need an outlet. And that's terrible that this is happening right now. Well, thanks so much for calling, Mark. And I know there are a lot of golfers out there who absolutely love the sport.

Casey on Discord has a comment about skiing as well. For me, it's skiing. I got priced out and have sort of soured on the vibe. Skiing was never cheap, but it's ridiculous now. Anytime I go, my class and environmental consciousness screams. It's hard because my family still loves it. I haven't taken a ski trip for a while because of the time, cost, and zero-sum nature of trips. I don't want to spend all of my travel funds on a single ski trip.

Tyler Jasmine said something interesting that resonated with me, which is just sort of the how you get seeing yourself get better at something. And I know that this is something that also you've experienced, too. Absolutely. You know, I think this is, again, one of those ways in which

when hobbies become more expensive, when you have to dial them back, it's not just a frivolous matter of how you're spending leisure time. You know, there's, I think, a real sense of self-worth and self-esteem that comes with improving at something, you know, just to use examples from the hobbies I'm familiar with. You know, when I used to shoot, I was pretty good. And I, you know, in order to be pretty good, you need to shoot, you know, around a case of ammo a week. Now that is just, you know,

extraordinarily unaffordable, right? So it's just not possible to, at least for me anyway, to balance the other hobbies I want to do with that one while still trying to do it at a high level. And I think something a number of callers or commentators have said is, you know, the

person who's talking about golfing mentioned, you know, maintaining level of play, you know, again, that might sound frivolous, but there's a real sense of dignity and self-worth that comes when you see yourself improving at something, when you're trying to get better, when you can, you know, earn the respect of people in that community because you're working

hard at something and they can see your improvement. And that's all something that's lost when you're forced to transform from a serious hobbyist to someone who maybe does it every once in a while. And that's, again, that's a real cost. And conversely, your self-esteem can take a bit of a hit when you see yourself getting worse at something. Yeah.

Yes. Yeah. I mean, to be honest with you, you know, one of the reasons why I don't shoot sporting clays as much anymore, I have some friends and family that that do it and they'll invite me, you know, for a general person, I'm still pretty good. But, you know, I'm like, oh, man, I used to be so much better than this. It's a real blow to my self-esteem. So I, you know, barely even want to join them at this point.

Yeah. You know, one of the things too, when you were talking earlier about, you know, the totally different people that you can meet doing a hobby, right? And I think you said something really funny in your piece where you were like, were it not for my hobbies, nearly all of my friends would be highly educated liberal professionals living in the suburbs of a coastal city with cool restaurants. So one of the things that I was struck by was it really suggests that

When you're in that kind of a group, the priority is the hobby, right? The priority is getting better at it, supporting each other at getting better at it. And do you see that as kind of a lubricant for the friction that comes with like different political leanings and things like that?

Yeah, absolutely. You know, for whatever reason, the hobbies I've I happen to have are ones that I think in the public mind are pretty conservative coded. I happen to be a liberal person, you know, but in these kinds of spaces, whether it's, you know, gun club or fishing club or whatever, they're very politically diverse. But the priority is, you know, the fishing or the shooting, you know, so I don't necessarily care if.

if someone in my fishing club votes differently than I, I do, at least in the context of the club, if they can teach me something that's useful, you know? And so I think that's really, um, it's an important social lubricant. I think it allows us to see people who might be different from us in some way, whether that is, you know, socioeconomically or politically or racially or whatever, um, to, you know, to see them in three dimensions rather than through sort of a,

narrow identity category. So I do think the fact that hobbies in these kind of hobby organizations, the hobby takes first priority over those kinds of differences is really sort of, there's a crucial kind of civic function to that, that I think it would be very dangerous for we to lose it. You also talk about how the structure of hobbies, the fact that they're communities with rules and norms helps too. How so?

You know, I think, you know, we live in a secular modern society where things can seem chaotic and in flux and like the ground is constantly shifting under our feet. And hobby communities tend to have norms and rules and ways of speaking that you can become sort of, you know, acculturated into and I think there is some sense that

you know, these are places where I know how things work. I know where I stand in the pecking order, whether I'm, you know, a novice or an intermediate or somebody more advanced. I know, you know, what the rules of the road are in terms of behavior, in terms of how to speak about something, you know, in terms of how to do the thing itself. And I think there's something really comforting to that. You know, many of us feel like in our work lives or other lives or, you know, just the country we live in, things are pretty chaotic. And I think

Having these spaces that don't feel that way, I think, is really useful. We're talking about the rising costs of hobbies with Tyler Austin Harper and with you, our listeners. Tell us about a hobby you've been priced out of, a hobby you would never give up because it means so much to you, a community you've built through your hobby, or how maybe...

Things like tariffs are also becoming a factor in the cost of your hobby at 866-733-6786 at the email address forum at kqed.org or by posting on Instagram or Threads or Blue Sky or Facebook. Vivian on Discord writes...

Excuse me.

A listener writes, this is something I think about a lot. Are hobbies getting more expensive or are we just getting socialized to assume we need more gear to get started? For example, I love to sew and I regularly buy more and fancier fabric than I really need for my skills. They're so easily available online. Maybe I'd be a better hobbyist if I kept material simple and focused on the craft I love. What do you think, Tyler?

I think that's totally right. You know, and I think hobbies tend to often overlap with collecting communities in various ways, you know, whether that's collecting fabrics or, you know, my case, collecting fishing lures, or as we call them in saltwater fishing, fishing plugs, you know. And so if you look at my basement, you'll see a pegboard wall that is filled with far too many, you know, fishing lures, only a vanishing, you know,

fraction of that which I end up using on a regular basis. And so I think something I think about a lot is how to think about

collecting fishing lures is a hobby as distinct from actually doing the fishing. Right. Um, and it would be possible to fish is just as much as I want to fish and, you know, spend a lot less on, on things that are mostly just going to gather dust on, on my wall. But I do think there's a lot of social pressure to, to feel as though you need the latest gear. You need every available, you know, a piece of equipment that in some possible universe, you could, you could

you know, maybe need. And I think that turns a lot of people off because they think, well, in order to do ABC seriously, I need X, Y, Z. And there are some ways in which, or sometimes that can be true. The kind of saltwater fishing I do involves being physically in the water. And so you need waterproof, you know, rust resistant reels to actually do that. And you really can't

do it without them. But there are plenty of other pieces of equipment that are like to have rather than needs to have, you know, and I think it's important to distinguish them. And I think our culture doesn't really encourage us to distinguish those categories. Well, Adele on Discord writes, one lesson I had learned from a classmate was to gravitate toward anything free. So a pastime I subscribe to for myself is to go to the local public library. There's so much to do there.

Um, Adele goes on to say one friend of mine likes to spend his time at Disneyland. He's been an annual past subscriber for as long as I can remember. I cannot imagine though, what kind of costs are incurred for families still going there. Uh, this makes me want to ask another question of our audience, which is any tips for saving money, doing your hobby. Uh, and, uh,

Steven writes, Wow, that's another wrinkle I hadn't actually thought of. Me neither, that's great. And Vivian writes,

The point about hobby businesses suffering makes me think about Joanne Fabrics going bankrupt. Despite being wildly popular, Joanne's bankruptcy was apparently due to them being acquired by a private equity firm. In the wake of their closure, bigger companies like Michaels are scrambling to grab their customer base, which itself was apparently acquired by driving local fabric stores out of business.

capitalism eats itself, I guess. We've actually had a couple of people writing in about Joanne's. There's that, but Joanne's, as I understand, was also like a community, people who went there. I don't know if you know much about it, but yeah. Yeah.

No, no, I think that's definitely true. You know, and I think I've certainly, you know, thought very differently about some of those, you know, chain stores that previously I would have rolled my eyes at like Barnes and Noble. But now I'm like, well, you know what? It's really good that we at least have some brick and mortar bookstores and people aren't buying things through Amazon, you know, and I'd prefer if that was an indie bookseller. But, you know, Barnes and Noble is definitely better than the alternative. And I think, you know, the Joanne Fabric story is probably a little similar to that.

Yeah. So I want to focus a little bit on more on the effect of tariffs. And you've touched on this a little bit. But I've been I was thinking that maybe people would start feeling it a little bit later, but they're very much feeling it now.

Yeah, you know, I think in part that's because the sort of media coverage of tariffs, and not that I'm blaming the media for this, but I think it's giving some companies sort of permission to increase prices in advance, you know, where people are expecting the price increases and so they are, you know, just hiking the prices before some of those supply shocks hit. I think that's not everywhere across the board, but it's something I've definitely seen in phishing, certainly.

And, you know, I also think these tariffs have just caused various kinds of disruptions and uncertainties in the supply chain that are actually causing, you know, real material impacts that are leading some manufacturers to increase prices generally apologetically. But, yeah, no, I think it's a real problem. And it's definitely only going to get worse, you know. So, I mean, this is another example where class matters. You know, as I mentioned, the kind of fishing I do requires...

A very specialized reel. There's really only two companies that make them. And one company is so hard to acquire their products that for all intents and purposes, there's really only one company that makes the fishing reels you need for this particular kind of fishing. So when I saw the tariffs coming down the pipeline, the first thing I did was buy a backup one of these reels in case I ended up having a problem with mine for some reason. But not everyone can afford to do that.

You know, and, you know, even if they increase in price, I'm fortunate that I'll still be able to pay it. But a lot of people won't, you know, and so I think it's only going to get worse. It's only going to cause more problems. And these tariffs are only going to price more people out of out of, you know, some some leisure activities.

Steve writes, smaller board game makers are looking at an existential threat because of tariffs. It was a huge and fast-growing industry now facing a massive implosion. Bigger companies like Hasbro are likely to have workarounds, but the makers of Catan and Wingspan, other popular games, are likely to be hit very hard indeed. And actually, right after the break, listeners will talk with somebody who is in the gaming community today.

For now, tell us if there's a hobby that's becoming less affordable for you and what your concerns are about that. A community you've built through your hobby or a community you worry about losing because you won't be able to afford your hobby any longer. Have tariffs already had an effect on the cost of your hobby or do you worry that

It will. And do you have any tips for saving money doing your hobby? And of course, if there's a hobby that you would never give up because you love it so much, tell us what it means to you. Tyler Austin Harper describes how hobbies, yes, they are non-essential, but yet at the same time, we can't let that stop us from seeing just how serious the consequences are on a society of a loss of community building through hobbies. We'll have more after the break. I'm Nina Kidd.

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Discover top brands at unexpectedly low prices. Sierra, let's get moving. We're talking with Tyler Austin Harper, who's written a piece for The Atlantic called What We Lose When We're Priced Out of Our Hobbies, where he observes hobby inflation is likely to register and may already be registering real social, political, and economic consequences. Because not only are hobbies good for the well-being of those who take them up, they also connect people to their communities, help them make new friends, and bring them into contact with people who

whom whether by virtue of age, race, or socioeconomic circumstance, they might otherwise have no occasion to know. And let me go to caller Jerry in San Mateo. Hi, Jerry, you're on.

Hello, thank you. Yeah, my hobby is tea and tea drinking. And I just really like exploring all the different kinds of teas there are because there's a huge variety. And part of the fun is also learning how to brew them so that they get the best flavor.

And it's a pretty inexpensive hobby because you can buy the tea, but then many tea leaves can be re-infused three or even up to five times. I think about the most expensive tea that I've come across is matcha tea, which in the United States costs about a dollar a gram. And usually you can make it...

for one serving is like one or one and a half grams, or maybe three if you like it really strong. But I'm kind of concerned because obviously the tariffs could easily affect the cost of the teas since the best teas really come from China and then Japan and Taiwan. So

So that's a distinct possibility that the prices on those could go up quite a lot if the tariffs from China remain really high.

Geri, thanks. I hadn't thought about tea. And I also hadn't thought about games and their connection to China until I was doing research for this show. I want to bring in John Brieger, board member of Golden Gate Game Makers and co-owner of Solis Game Studio. John, thanks so much for coming on the show.

for having me on, Mina. Yeah, so first, I also didn't realize that the Bay Area has a huge gaming community or is a big board game community too and creative community. Yeah.

Absolutely. We are one of the hotbeds of game design and development in America. Golden Gate Game Makers, which is a nonprofit community organization, represents and supports over 500 designers and developers that are based across the Bay. Very popular games, including ones mentioned by your listener, are developed and produced here. Things like Pandemic from Matt Leacock lives in Sunnyvale.

And many others. It's a really wonderful, vibrant community. There's over 40 game-focused retail and toy stores in the Bay. And that kind of community and third place, as mentioned by Austin Tyler Harper, is really under threat from the tariffs. Yeah, help me understand all the ways that the board game, well, I guess we'll start with the developer community, is being affected by tariffs.

Something that I think is a good analogy is if you have an American author who writes a book and they sign that book to an American publisher, it's edited, they hire an illustrator to make a nice cover, and that book is then printed in Canada, that's not a Canadian book. That's an American book. That's the great American novel. It's

And I really view new games the same way. The products that I make are culturally, creatively and and capitally American products. So when we look at something like 145% tariff on China with the goal of bringing back domestic manufacturing for some of these kinds of goods.

To me, that's the administration looking and saying, your jobs don't matter. Your jobs aren't the kinds of jobs we care about keeping in America. Because the costs will be so astronomical?

The costs are absolutely enormous. We already are a very thin margin industry. I don't make games because I want to make the most money. I make games because I want to bring joy to the world. And the reality is the ability to produce those games domestically is very limited, not just by cost, but by capability. Have you ever shuffled a deck of cards? Yeah. Yeah.

Those aren't made here? So you can make cards in the United States, but you know how they sort of snap back into place? They don't crease like a piece of paper would.

And that snap back is from a core in the cardstock, and it requires a special kind of paper, which is made by no paper mills in the United States. So even the factories that can make some of these kinds of things in the States have to source almost every piece of raw material and component from overseas. And all those like little intricate game pieces or even, you know, the dice, same thing, I understand. Yeah.

Yes. We don't have the knowledge base and quantity of skilled engineers and tooling specialists and machinists to produce at the scale that the US industry needs and that there's demand for from hobbyists. 80% of all toys and games sold in the United States are imported from China specifically, not just imported in general.

And that's a huge amount of knowledge. I don't work with our manufacturing partner in China just because the cost is lower. I work with them because they're immensely skilled and we've built a relationship about understanding our production process for years. Game makers are delaying

Producing games because they're seeing how this will play out. What about board game fans, right? What kinds of increases could they see for the games they want to get? Or even availability, it sounds like. We're going to see rapidly increase.

an inability to purchase games that you might want. We've already started to see mass layoffs and closures within the board game industry. As I said, we're very sensitive to price changes. And especially I think about the community that gets built through games. Games bring people together. And so much of that is happening in places like public libraries, game cafes,

the local game retail stores, and those stores are going to have trouble getting stock in because publishers are delaying their shipments out of China or their other factories due to tariffs. And even if the tariffs come down, we're looking at potentially skyrocketing shipping prices similar to in 2020 when demand for shipping went up and we had a global shipping crisis due to increased shipping demand. Hmm.

Well, Don, I really appreciate you giving us a little bit of insight into what the gaming community faces, both developers and people who are into it. Before I let you go, what got you so into it? I have always loved games. I grew up playing things like Cribbage and Rummy and Risk with my family. And...

I love the way that they bring people together. I started making games part-time when I was a corporate designer working on retail stores and fell in love with it. It's been my dream to make games and I'm fortunate enough that I now get to do it full-time.

But for many of us in the Bay, it's something that we do part-time and we hope to be able to spread that joy and share that with other people through our community. And I think that's what really saddens me is all of the friends I've made, all of the wonderful people I've met through games, those spaces where we meet could be out of business by the end of the year. John Breger, board member of Golden Gate Game Makers and co-owner of Solis Game Studio. Thanks so much for talking with us. Thanks so much for having me on.

Ben on Discord writes, I've been able to stay close with my blood family across the Rockies and Sierras by skiing and snowboarding with them. I might have disowned many of them over Trump support if I hadn't had those wonderful experiences lapping powder runs. Another person is underscoring what you were saying earlier, Tyler, though another listener is wondering if you've ever had any liberal friends question your pursuits like shooting and bourbon collecting.

Oh, yeah. Yeah, that's a good question. The bourbon collecting? No, no. Liberals love bourbon. But the shooting, the shooting, definitely. But it's not something I make a point of emphasizing very frequently, you know. But I do. Well, you know, I know people have strong feelings about guns and shooting in general, you know. And so.

You know, it's not something I hide, certainly, but it's not something I also volunteer immediately either. But funnily enough, I had a very close friend, another very liberal guy like myself, who sort of...

sheepishly asked me a bit ago, um, you know, could we go shooting? I was like, Oh yeah, I'm happy to take you shooting. So, um, you know, I, I took him to, uh, the, this indoor gun range and I think he was expecting it to be, um, a very different kind of place than it, than it ended up being, you know, and he was like, everyone here is so friendly and, you know, uh, it was, uh, you know, I think he expected it to be, you know, really, uh, you know, just statues of, of, uh, Donald Trump and American flags everywhere, you know, and it was, uh,

much more diverse space, uh, than he anticipated. And yeah, I had a great, had a great time, you know? So, um, I do think that's one of the other benefits of hobbies is, you know, you do, um, both you, you get to see other people, including people who are different from you in three dimensions. But I also think, um, they tend to bust misconceptions about what those kinds of spaces are like, you know, I think, um, people tend to assume that, uh,

gun club or fishing club is a place that is not very diverse politically, is not very diverse racially. And sure, I would say that there are probably more conservatives than liberals in those kinds of spaces. But people will be really surprised, I think, by the political diversity in the kinds of hobbies that I think the public tends to view as sort of right-coded.

Yeah. But at the same time, it goes the other way, too. Have you been able to bust stereotypes for some of the more conservative folks that you engage with when they learn that you, I think, described yourself as like a Bernie Sanders person?

Yeah, exactly. Definitely, for sure. You know, I think there are certainly people in those two hobby communities who, you know, find out that I'm a liberal journalist and like, oh, you're not, you know, you're not that bad. So I think it definitely goes both ways, for sure. Well, yeah.

We are getting comments and tips about the rising costs of hobbies and also how to save money. This listener writes, I've been sewing since I was eight years old. My mom taught me how to use the machine. Now, 70 years later, I'm paying between $15 to $20 a yard for good fabric. I make clothes and do alterations for friends. I also make quilts and comforters for refugees. Oh, and rely on fabric donations. When I go to a quilt store, I buy fabric just to keep them in business since I don't need more in my stash.

Lynn writes,

Let me remind listeners, you are listening to Forum. I'm Mina Kim. Let me go to caller Bonnie in San Francisco. Hi, Bonnie. You're on. Hey, good morning. How are you? I'm well. What's on your mind? Good, good.

Well, I'm a senior, and so hobbies, I mean, that's my life. You retire, and what do you get? Hobbies. And I love it. It's great. It's great. But basically, you know, I'm really nervous. Scrap, which is a San Francisco...

place for hobbyists, all kinds of problems because of the administration and cuts. And so I worry because that's my community and I won't have that. And I've got granddaughters that want rainbow dresses, which forces me into fabric stores where, like you say, I'm just shocked at the way the prices are. And they tell me it's only going to get

worse. I'm looking for rainbow fabric and rainbow fabric is expensive because apparently every little girl wants a rainbow dress. I'm

I mean, I'm amused, but I'm on a fixed income. Yeah. You know, and it's so nothing's going to change for me, except it's going to get pricier and pricier. And it's the only thing I really have that I enjoy. So I'm really troubled by it. Yeah. Well, Bonnie, I really appreciate it.

Yeah, I really appreciate you sharing its value to you. And yes, the very concerns that Tyler is laying out with regard to what we lose when we're priced out of our hobbies.

Well, Ray on Discord writes,

Rebecca writes, I've been playing acoustic guitar as a hobby for a few years and have been thinking about buying a new guitar, a Rickenbacker to be exact. But with economic uncertainty, I'll be putting that off for a while. And instead, I bought some secondhand books to learn more acoustic playing techniques and watching YouTube tutorials, which are free.

Emily writes, I love to bake. I find it relaxing and it brings a lot of happiness to my family. Our favorite is chocolate chip cookies, but the price of chocolate chips has over doubled in the past several months. I could usually find a bag of Nestle Tollhouse for $3.99 on sale, but now chocolate chips are pushing $10 for a 12 ounce bag. Nuts are getting pricier too. I think twice before whipping up a batch or choose recipes that don't include chocolate.

Tyler, how are you making your fishing hobby work? I understand you're hyper-focused on it. And I even saw that you wrote a piece about extreme fishing. You engage in extreme fishing. What is extreme fishing?

So I do a kind of fishing in the ocean for striped bass called wetsuiting, where you wear a wetsuit and you sort of deep wade or swim to these offshore rocks at night. Big striped bass are mostly nocturnal, so it's sort of a nighttime endeavor. But as you can imagine, that's a sport that's very gear intensive, right? Because...

You're immersed in the saltwater constantly. Everything rusts, so everything has to be corrosion resistant. You need special belts to hold all your gear on while you're swimming. You need special kinds of rods, equipment, shoes that will have spikes that grip onto rocks the whole nine yards. Unfortunately, there's just not a way to...

do it very cheaply. And it's the kind of thing too, where, you know, in certain cases you don't want to be cost cutting because, you know, some of the equipment, you know, is about matters of safety, which are pretty important, you know? And so, you know, I'm fortunate to be able to, you know,

to do it. Um, I've definitely cut back on some other things because like I said, the, the fishing is certainly my, uh, my top priority, uh, in terms of, uh, as far as hobbies go, but yeah, it's, you know, um, it's, it's not a cheap one and, you know, even something like gas, which is something we haven't talked about, but, um, is, you know, another thing, you know, I, like I said, I probably fish 80 nights a year, most years on average. Um,

traveling anywhere from 20 minutes to an hour and 15 minutes, depending on what fishing spot I'm going to. That's a lot of gas over the course of the year, you know? And so when things get more expensive, you know, it's, you know, it's, it's hard. So I definitely think it's, you know,

you know, it forces us to make tough choices. And those choices about what hobbies we do, again, aren't just choices about how we spend our time, but they're choices about who we spend time with, what kinds of communities we're engaged in, what kinds of people we get to know, and so on. Yeah. It was interesting to read that people were surprised that you would risk your life for this and also that you tend to throw the bass back in the water or you don't keep it.

No, no. Mostly I'm fishing for, you know, the people who do this kind of activity are fishing for sort of trophy class striped bass. And for conservation reasons, you can only keep smaller striped bass. And so the ones I'm looking for are a little bigger than the kind you can keep. And regardless, you know, they have a lot of mercury. And besides, I am a kind of, you know,

bleeding heart liberal at the end of the day, despite all the fishing and shooting. So I let him swim away. Thanks so much for talking with us, Tyler. Really appreciate it. Absolutely. It's been a pleasure. Thanks for having me on. And check out his piece in The Atlantic, What We Lose When We're Priced Out of Hobbies. Martin writes, on a macro level, the Trump administration's large scale cuts and funding to parks and other nurturing and creative spaces, including theaters, will have profound consequences on hobbies and their physical and emotional impact.

Benefits, hobby writ large, might seem unessential, but most people have them in order to nurture their minds and bodies to fortify themselves from external forces that often cause harm and anxiety. Thank you, listeners. Thanks, Tessa and Mark, for producing this segment. This is Forum. I'm Mina Kim. Funds for the production of Forum are provided by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, the Generosity Foundation, and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Support for Forum comes from San Francisco Opera. Experience the soaring highs and heartbreaking lows of bohemian life this summer in John Caird's beloved production of La Boheme. Puccini's most adored opera transports us into the heady bohemian world of 19th century Paris as we follow a circle of starving artists falling in and out of love, living for the moment. La Boheme runs June 3rd to 21st.

Learn more at sfopera.com. Greetings, Boomtown. The Xfinity Wi-Fi is booming! Xfinity combines the power of internet and mobile. So we've all got lightning-fast speeds at home and on the go. That's where our producers got the idea to mash our radio shows together. Xfinity!

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I'm Jorge Andres Olivares and I'm hosting a new show, Hyphenacion. Unlike many other hyphenated Latinos in the U.S., our cultures and our communities inform our choices, like with money. We had that pressure to be the breadwinner. Religion. I just think Jesus was what we would now define as Christ.

and family. We're not physically close and we're not like that emotionally close either. So join me and some amigas as we have easy conversations about hard things. Catch Hyphenación from KQED Studios wherever you get your podcasts and on YouTube.