Some numbers

During my lesson, Bob was telling me some numbers, that will no longer be accurate, but I will do my best to repeat them for a rough idea:
98% of event riders are single women ages 35-42, who make more than $100,000/year.
An average novice horse now sells for $15-20,000;
A training level horse for $20-30,000;
and a Prelim horse for $35,000 and up.

I'm not 35 yet, but I'm not going to be making $100,000/year unless I switch to private practice and then don't ride anymore but pay Bob to ride. (He has offered, numerous times now, to take Mercury at training level if I pay for the shows. I can't really tell if he's joking because I don't see how inexperienced Mercury, even in Bob's very capable hands, could do some of those jump combinations.)
Bob also said that a lot of those "riders" are actually rich women who pay trainers to ride.
And I'll go ahead and post this - Mercury only cost $3500. Even if he's "green", what a bargain for a horse who will hopefully one day go training level (since it will take both of us many years to get there - though it's a race against Mercury's age since he's 13 this year).
The other thing Bob said was that a lot of riders don't learn how to "train" the horse, so they have to get new horses every 2-5 years when the new horse starts to exhibit the same problems as the old horse (rider-source). One reason why the horses cost so much is it takes a lot of time to train them.
He said we were in the "fine-tuning" stage with Mercury this year - that last year was the big stuff, and now we're focusing on details. It doesn't feel like details to me, it feels like a plateau. But I see his point - if he teaches me how to train Mercury, then I can sort of work with the next horse too. It's just frustrating and time consuming. And I never want Bob to leave.
He said I just need to be patient - now Mercury just needs experience for the next couple years.