MLB ticket prices from various sources, including a few from academics and a long series (to 2002) from Doug Pappas. To maintain comparable series, the data are presented here in two series: The Simple Average Series and The Weighted Average Series. The files are all in MSExcel format. So, use your "Save Target As" command to save them to your hard disk.
The Simple Average Series
To the best of my knowledge, this series is the simple average of the different seat prices published by each team. There is a complete data series from Doug Pappas, 1950-62, 1963-85 (no, I don't know why there are no 1963 data). Other researcher reports are listed in various years along with his. Just recently, Forbes has also been reporting "Average Ticket Price" that I take to be a simple average.
Simple Average Series: 1950-62, 1964-85, 2007-08
The Weighted Average Series
An early file from U.S. Congressional hearings (1952), a file from Roger Noll (1971, 1975-1988), and the TMR data (1991-on) are weighted averages by seat type. Rather than a simple average price, the proportions of each seat-type if the stadium were full is used to calculate the weighted average price. Note that the proportion of seats by type may certainly have varied over time. And the method used is consistent in the Noll data and in the TMR data, but may not be consistent across those two sets.
Weighted Average Series: 1952, 1971, 1975-88, 1991-2006
Inside The Weighted Average
An early file from U.S. Congressional hearings (1952) and two files from the Sports Business Journal show the percent of seats of each ticket type, the price of those seats, and calculation of a weighted average. I don't include these in the Weighted Average Series, above, because the percents may not be consistent with the other sources.
Prices by types of seats, %of seat types, weighted average by seat type, for each team: 1952 (Congressional hearings), 2002 (SBJ)
Prices by types of seats, %of seat types, weighted average by seat type, for Cincinnati Reds: 2003 (SBJ)