The cost of LP's and CD's - an observation

First CD's I bought in 1984 were $22 each.  I bought 10, plus my first CD player, a Sony CDP-200 for $450.  I was severely price-gouged but was in hog heaven and I didn't care, and I never looked back.  I have zero desire to pay $20-50 for new LP's.  I prefer owning music I love rather than renting it, so streaming remains little more than the new FM for me.

The easy answer is that LPs have become a status product. Status products cost more. CDs are not status products.

I'm glad there are people who still prefer the constraints of LPs and CDs. I sold off most of my CDs and recently found 40+ LPs in the basement I didn't know I still had that according to Discogs look to be worth at least $250 (using the lowest prices) wholesale in bulk. So now I can take those to my local vinyl store and get rid of them. Next step is to get rid of my old turntables that are wasting space. I was amazed to see that my first real turntable is selling for twice what I paid for it decades ago. Twenty years ago I thought I'd just wind up taking it to the dump. Meanwhile, my former CD and Bandcamp collection now resides on one 512GB flash drive and I have millions of albums to stream for ~ $150/yr.

ssmith

... LPs have become a status product. Status products cost more ...

They have ? To whom? Obviously not to you!

I'm glad there are people who still prefer the constraints of LPs and CDs.

@cleeds Obviously not to me. I got rid of (I thought) all my vinyl in 1990. But obviously to a niche of others it holds some kind of status, in-the-know or hip factor, otherwise all LPs would be at the dump with all the other obsolete technologies. Why else would you spend thousands of dollars on a turntable, cartridge and tens or hundreds of LPs on a technically inferior, inconvenient and space-consuming medium when the same money would give you 10-20 years of streaming millions of albums? OK, I get that a few prefer the added distortion of vinyl, but look at all the "pretty" megabucks turntables out there and all the vinyl aficionados who lust for them. That's not about function.

jssmith

...  it holds some kind of status, in-the-know or hip factor, otherwise all LPs would be at the dump with all the other obsolete technologies.

There are reasons to buy LPs other than the status you imagine they possess.

Why else would you spend thousands of dollars on a turntable, cartridge and tens or hundreds of LPs on a technically inferior, inconvenient and space-consuming medium when the same money would give you 10-20 years of streaming millions of albums?

This is the logical fallacy of "begging the question," also known as circular reasoning.

To understand why some still buy LPs, you might consider auditioning a high-end LP playback system at a local dealer. Then you might have an idea of what's possible with LP playback.