Mark, here's a quote from the US Sailing Site, describing their funcions:

At the October 1991 Annual Meeting, USYRU voted to change its name to the United States Sailing Association, Inc. and to do business as US SAILING. The new name more adequately described the broader activity of the organization and clarified the administration's intention to fulfill every aspect of the responsibilities of a National Governing Body under the auspices of the Amateur Sports Act.

In recent years, US SAILING has created and maintained the definitive national standards for sailing instruction and continues to develop highly successful training programs for young and adult sailors. The organization has embraced and supported the rapidly expanding public access programs known as Community Sailing, continues to create high-quality instructional and reference materials for race officials, and field successful Olympic and Pan American Games teams.

Mark, it's no longer called the -US Yacht Racing Union- for a reason. That reason is, even they figured out that if you don't first concentrate on teaching people to sail, you won't have too many sailboat racers.

As far as exclusivity, why don't you go and try to join the Corinthian YC in Marblehead, MA, and let me know how many -years- and how many -thousands- of dollars that will cost you, and the Coral Reef YC in Miami, or the St. Francis YC in SFO. Even the pissy little club I used to belong to in MA many years ago had an "Application fee" of over $200, 20 years ago, and then, IF you were allowed to join, a $400/yr. membership fee as well as racing fees, instrucional fees, boat storage fees, etc, etc, etc.

If you wanted your kid to take Opti lessons, that cost another $120, and again, this was 20 years ago. I'm sure prices have not come down since then.

If I had to go through all of that to start sailing, I never would have started sailing. I'd be riding a Jet Ski, like millions of others. If you want more racers, you first have to get more sailors, some of them will want to learn to race, just like we all did.

Everyone still reading this, raise your hand if you learned to sail at a Yacht Club.