Are you Guys Rich or What!?

I have read this thread as a "new" person with some interest and it seems to me there will be a permanent loop. What is one mans penny is another mans pound. The whole issue is subjective, I am sure that noone here doubts that 100k on music equipment in most contexts is irrational but we justify it because it brings us pleasure and in a world where that particular commodity is getting hard to come by, prices like taxes go up. I for one will always enjoy the reproduction of good music but will again do it by looking for those elusive deals. When your ten year old sits next to you identifying various instruments and presence that is justification enough for me.

In electronics engineering, we go by a rule of thumb that after the circuit is built, each effort to improve it by just 10% will double the costs.
Now don't apply this literally, but I did like sgmlaw's letter, posting the opinion that this is a hobby of diminishing returns.
Once you have a system you are happy with (didn't it knock your socks off when you bought it?) you are wise to enjoy it. Right now, people are drunk with money. The 'two-years removed' approach is very good advice, in my opinion.

It's not about how much you spend it's the enjoyment you get from the music. When I got out of college in 1976 the first thing I bought was as car (used) to get to work and next was my first stereo system. Mcintosh solid state seperates and Dalquist DQ10 speakers and a sub. This system served me very well for a number of years. To this day I still use the the Mac amp and pre amp and have upgraded to JM Utopia speakers (used) and a Cary 303 CD player (used). I will change out the amp and pre amp to Conrad Johnson equipment and add a sub for the speakers. I will never by new equipment again. This site provides great opportunites to gear at half the retail price. My tastes in music have changed over the years and I have extensive number of LP's and CD's. You can create an environment for every occasion! Music will set you free.

Now that the moral ceiling on audio equipment expenditures has been established at 7500 I suggest all of us immoral types make amends by dumping our equipment on the used market so the morally and otherwise politically correct can snap up the Krell, Levinson, Wadia, Wisdom etc. gear at morally correct bargain prices.

I have just $2k in my system and love it. I am not a neophyte to audio, nor am I rich. I just know what I like and found a way to get it - within my price range. Now you may smile at that, but my system is a direct-in(no preamp), tube OTL, DIY single-driver speakers setup that would, no doubt, sound very pleasing indeed to most, if not all, of the $100k system owners on this thread. After 25 years in audio, I found out how to focus in on exactly the sound I wanted, and researched the gear that could get me there. It can be done, and done well. Enjoyed the thread. Good listening to one and all.