Baseball Salaries: Larger or Smaller than Predicted?

The average salary S of a baseball player (in thousands of dollars per year) in year x (with 1982 corresponding to x=0) is given by the model:

Task 1: According to this equation, what should be the average salary of a baseball player today (2007)? Do you think this seems right? Explain.

Task 2: Search web sites, trying to find the current average salary for a player. Once you find it, try to explain why the prediction equation is or is not still valid.

Task 3: Consider the web site Baseball Almanac, which shows a graph of average baseball salaries beginning in 1970. Does this graph agree with your data...or the given equation? Is the situation as "exponential" as it looks? Explain.

Task 4: If you were to start from scratch and generate a prediction equation for average salaries, what would you do...and what is your resulting equation?