Ned Ludd
Silver $$ Contributor
Why? This sport acknowledges achievement, not how much was spent on the equipment that was used to generate the achievement. That is life in the real world. There has to be some measure of output, which in this case is the score. Who's to say exactly how a score shot with lesser equipment really compares to a score shot with more expensive equipment? How do you know exactly how much was the equipment and how much was the shooter? Compared to beginners, far more high level shooters are willing to spend significant dollar amounts on equipment because they know their skill level warrants the use of such equipment. I can further guarantee that you can put the most expensive, top-dollar F-Open or F-TR rig in the hands of a complete beginner and they're not going to shoot great scores with it. On the other hand, I've seen plenty of cases where shooters won matches without having the most expensive equipment on the line, because they were very good shooters. Who's to say whether a 195-5X shot with a $2000 setup is equal to, or better than a 200-12X shot with a $7500 setup? It's an output you simply can't quantify with any degree of accuracy and it's why socialist ideas usually fail in the long run, because they tend not to have a quantifiable output. It's easy to say, "Well, wouldn't it be great if we could do this?" However, it's most often the case that there is no good way to actually determine whether it was great or not. Some kind of quantifiable output is an absolute requirement to assess results, whether they are the results of a shooting match, or the results of a new approach to some problem, or anything else. We use score as that output, because it works. What's next, should we adjust a shooter's score based on the kind of reloading press they have? Once you go down this road, it will never end.
