Has the cost of HiFi gotten a bit too much?

I would rather have an engineering marvel like a Ferrari than an equivalent priced high end audio system.

Say a 296 GTB  for example - $568,300  Jays Audio is often reviewing systems in his basement , for this sort of price  

Or alternatively you could  have the Ferrari - With a long legged blonde in the front seat in tiniest  of mini skirts

C'mon men what would you really want?

Around 1985, I bought a Harman Kardon integrated amp (the 645 vxi) for around $250 IIRC. It's still hooked up in a bedroom system. These days, NAD sells a similar product (the C316BEE V2) for $479 (Crutchfield price).  So the price hasn't doubled in ~37 years.  But neither product has ethernet, USB, WiFi, bass management, upsampling, or an LCD touch screen.  In many HiFi components, new technologies not only inflate the price, they often become outdated within 5 years or so.  Same with vehicles. An infotainment system adds maybe $2000+ to the price, and is outdated many years before the engine starts burning oil.  Yet it provides little capability - much less, really - than you'd get from a $500 tablet. 

There are frequently frictional lags in the degree to which the prices of goods track input costs. However, the current global circumstances have created an unusual, if not unique, situation. We have become accustomed to a having very low interest rates and very low inflation, but that situation is now reversing. We also have the various global supply chain problems arising from various circumstances including the pandemic and the current war being waged by Russia on Ukraine. The UK is suffering from further cost increasing pressures arising from Brexit.

Often when faced with input price rises, manufacturers and service providers try to absorb the costs to maintain their position vis a vis competitors. However, there eventually comes a tipping point where they have to raise prices and the effect can look rather sudden even though it's the result of a period of sustained pressure.

Separate to all that, the stock of wealth in capitalist economies tends to increase over time as a result of rising productivity and also inheritance.

Aside from the current price pressures, I haven't seen radical rises in the price of high end audio. But what I have seen is the introduction of higher priced lines i.e. product lines where the price is higher ab initio - Constellation Audio and Techdas are examples.

@audioguy85,

This is what we call a sh**post.  This is how entire threads get deleted. A completely off-topic little rant.  I'm glad you feel better.