For just over a decade of my life, I caddied at the country club in the town I grew up in. While I do have PTSD from the alarm going off at 6 a.m. every Saturday and Sunday in my youthful summer years, I would not trade the experience for anything. I looped for guys 30 years my senior who I still keep in touch with to this day. I learned valuable lessons, heard countless off-color jokes, discovered the magic of baby powder and, most importantly, figured out that you must first dip the club face into the water, then scrape the dirt out with the brush and then put it back into the water (good as new, every time). For the young-ins out there, I cannot recommend it as a side job or summer gig more strongly. And for the older crowd who has made a legitimate career out of it, I respect the hell out of ya.<\/p>\n
Having said that, has the \u201ccaddie fee\u201d at nice clubs and popular public courses gotten completely out of control? Or is it just me?<\/p>\n
RELATED: Stupid Golf Problems: A unique twist on the hoodie debate<\/p>\n
Here\u2019s a tweet I came across over the holidays that stopped me dead in my worn-down Nikes I used to trek up the mountainous 10th hole at Rockaway River Country Club in with a 30-pound golf bag on each shoulder:<\/p>\n
If you\u2019re playing a T100 course in America and you don\u2019t pay your caddie $200 a bag you are wrong. Especially if you live on either coast, or in a major city.<\/p>\n
\u2014 Devereux \u201cbird dog\u201d Emmet (@EmmetDevereux) December 10, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n Keep in mind, this tweet is from a member of the Golf Burnerverse, a place where utterly absurd declarations are made daily about everything from how to enter the locker room at a private club to what your medium-sized Peter Millar shirt says about your status as a man. In other words, it\u2019s the perfect place for generating ideas for these Stupid Golf Problems.<\/p>\n Back to the tweet \u2013 does that say \u2026 TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS A BAG?!<\/p>\n Upon closer inspection, it sure does, with the stipulation(s) that it\u2019s at a top-100 course in America (he\u2019s obviously referring to Golf Digest\u2019s America\u2019s 100 Greatest Golf Courses ranking) or simply a nice private club in a major city or on one of the coasts. It\u2019s no surprise that a so-called Burnerverse rule is extremely convoluted, but I digress.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s the thing, though, our friend Devereux \u201cbird dog\u201d Emmet (funny enough, Deveruex Emmet was the architect of the course I caddied at) is not exactly off base. Just this past fall, I got the foursome-filling last-second invite from my dad to play one of the most exclusive clubs in America. The type of place where every member of our group was given their own caddie, all of whom were S-tier level loopers. To be expected at a place like this one.<\/p>\n After finishing up on 18, I asked my dad on the stroll back to the clubhouse how much he was giving his guy. Despite how great my job is and the access it gives me to great courses, my dad has reached a place in life where he frequents these types of places much more often than I do, so he has a much better pulse on how much to give. Without giving it a second thought, he told me \u201c$200.\u201d Two-hundred dollars. For one bag. I caddied in the wrong era. Back in my day, a serious sentence I just wrote at the age of 33, I was paid $40 per bag, plus tip (this was the case for all 11 years I caddied, from 2006 to 2017). On a good day when I double-bagged it and didn\u2019t royally screw up, I\u2019d receive $60 from each member, $120 total. And I felt like Jeff Bezos strutting into the local Italian Deli. Give me the No. 7 with balsamic, please, and yes I will be getting chips AND a drink. Because I\u2019m rich.<\/p>\n RELATED: Stupid Golf Problems: I\u2019m on my phone the whole round. Does everyone hate me?<\/p>\n Let me just preface what I\u2019m going to say next by saying this \u2013 I do not want to take any money out of anyone\u2019s pockets, especially caddies. But we do need to have a legitimate discussion about how out of hand this has gotten. Two-hundred dollars for some very light exercise, to me, is obscene. You might call it keeping up with the standard inflation rate, which it is. I call it being paid double the price for half the work. If you parachuted me in to a nice club in 2026 and I carried one bag and left with two benjamins, I would feel like I stole something.<\/p>\n What should be done about this? I\u2019m not suggesting anything, really. I\u2019m not going to be the one to start a movement that messes with some poor kid\u2019s college fund or a middle-aged man\u2019s livelihood. Not to mention the fact that at private clubs where caddies are making $200 for one bag, the members can very obviously afford it. And if you\u2019re a guest? You are lucky to be there and you should ask the host how much to give and not come in a single dollar short. As for public courses with caddies, you always have the option to not take one.<\/p>\n Still, there is something about taking a caddie at a great course that always leaves me opining that it is still the absolute best way to enjoy the sport, and worth whatever the price tag happens to be. Getting the benefits of walking without the physical toll of carrying your own bag is second-to-none. A green-in-regulation followed by a putter hand-off? I could ascend to heaven every time. Trusting a veteran caddie\u2019s read or line off the tee that you didn\u2019t see and executing on it? Perfection. You want anything at the turn, bud? Gatorade? Hot dog? My first-born? Just say the word, fam.<\/p>\n If you take enough caddies, what you\u2019ll come to find out is you are mostly paying a premium on three-to-four hours of companionship. If the caddie happens to save you a stroke or three along the way, that\u2019s a big bonus. Unless the caddie is so glaringly bad or just downright rude, you\u2019re going to fork over whatever your host suggests or whatever the normal fee is at your club. Otherwise, you run the risk of becoming the cheap-o that everyone talks about. Of course, that doesn\u2019t mean that, like me, you aren\u2019t allowed to find it preposterous that guys make $200 for one bag and didn\u2019t even make the effort to find the $12 pro shop ProV1x in some light fescue. Just remember who warned you first when, by 2035, you\u2019re carrying your own bag for 9 holes and the caddie carries it for the other 9 holes and you owe them $400 for their efforts.<\/p>\n Do you have a \u201cstupid\u201d golf problem? A question you\u2019re too ashamed to ask your close friends? A conundrum that needs to be talked out in a public forum? We\u2019re here to help. If you have etiquette-related inquiries or just want to know how to handle some of the unique on- or off-course situations we all find ourselves in, please let us know. You can email me ([email\u00a0protected]<\/a>) or send me a DM on Twitter\/X (@Cpowers14) or on Instagram (@cpthreeve).<\/p>\n This article was originally published on golfdigest.com<\/p>\n