Sopra No.2 Overpriced?

To say something is "over priced" or not, only the marketplace determines that.

My friends who consider Bose to be "high end audio" are shocked at how much my equipment costs...so to them it's all "over priced".

When I took Econ100 back in the day the professor said "how much is something worth...it's what people are willing to pay"...

I would venture to say that any gear made in china is over-priced. We all know how "cheap" the labor force in that country.

jafant, in my experience most companies strive to make as much profit as the markets will allow.  The advent of the labor unions in the U.S. gave workers more leverage here.  Think of all the IT jobs outsourced to India.  India's compensation for IT professionals, job for job, is way below our standards.   

"I would venture to say that any gear made in china is over-priced. We all know how "cheap" the labor force in that country."

Come on Jafant, I've read enough of your posts to know you're smarter than a generalized, myopic statement like that.  As if the cost of labor were the only input on which the price of an item is based.  Did you accidentally get served a decaf at Starbucks this morning?

So, lots of off topic points I want to contribute to.

The quality of products made in China is directly proportional to the parent company’s willingness to control that quality and partner with the manufacturer. Very high quality and crap comes out of Chinese assembly lines, all of it determined by the buyers.

The productivity of the American worker continues to go up while salaries have remained flat for the past 15 years.

Having said that, my own secret calculations say that the High End prices are around 10x the driver costs. Some are better, like Lawrence Audio, and some are much worse. I would put Focal at a much higher rate, plus they benefit from really cheap cabinets and inexpensive in-house drivers. The Magico S1 Mk II which I am not a fanboy for (nor particularly upset by) is all aluminum, and has 2 very nice Scanspeak drivers with proprietary cones and moderately expensive Mundorf crossovers. Then you have some one like Bose selling a 5.1 system out of 6 plastic boxes and $2 drivers for over $1,500. Amazing. :)