posted in another thread a week ago, sorry if you've read it already:
I guess I'm one who doesn't find the pricing (not price) mostly reasonable.
nearly 4.5 years ago, 2012 the original rMBP I purchased was 2.6 i7 16GB ram, 256GB SSD with retina screen was 2279$..
With just CPI inflation of nearly 5.2% that price today would be 2400$. And, not coincidentally that is EXACTLY what the price of the NEW 15" touch bar rMPB is, with a 2.6 ghz processor and 16GB RAM and 256GB SSD.
Now, I know that everyone likes to think that the price of technology and electronics goes DOWN overtime, which it does relative to PERFORMANCE but for the most part the RETAIL price of technology does NOT go down. Companies are very loath to ever have the retail price of ANYTHING go down as it makes their overall revenue and profit picture looks WORSE year to year and that's bad for stock performance and optics. So, we get NEW and better and FASTER and lighter technology and we get new and better R&D in the shape of form factors and materials and battery life and features, etc. But we won't necessarily get lower prices product to product.
But, what we don't really get is LOWER prices and for the most part, with generations of system upgrades or major new product models, we should get a pass through of inflation and some R&D cost applied. Over the lifetime of a generation of mac models, we'll get performance upgrades and usually over 2-5 years we'll actually get price DECREASES, but we don't usually see a price INCREASE DURING a generation product as manufacturers don't like to try and push inflation adjustments onto the consumer so optically. They wait for a generational STEP to make the STEP UP in adjusted pricing for inflation. I'm fine with that.
So, while noone likes to pay MORE for something that what they used to - with the neglect of any calculation to the value of the new products features or performance - its just the way of the world. True with technology, computer equipment, cell phones, medical devices and equipment, AUTOMOBILES, air conditioners, pretty much anything that doesn't have a major commodity component that could be canabalized or optimized.
In the past 4.5 years, we've had DOMESTICALLY 5.2% inflation. Internationally, especially in China we've had MUCH HIGHER inflation and that WAGE inflation for manufacture is certainly a component of the necessary cost increases. New devices require new manufacturing techniques and processes. Lines must be changed, workers must be skilled up, these workers in china are up nearly 20% in the past five years, for wages. Inflation in China is up TWICE the USA domestic inflation amount. Many of these input costs for computer parts are sourced in Asia/China, and they have had more inflation that we domestically have had.
The changes to pricing for foreign markets is yet another factor, and in the case of the UK it is a necessary shift due to what is most certainly going to be a PROLONGED drop in the value of the british pound and a currency adjustment is warranted and necessary. This is due to brexit, no way around it. We had the same thing a few years back as the russian rouble was cratering and all pricing had to be adjusted - IN REAL TIME and during the year - no product cycle adjustments to try and hide it.
So, we may not like having to pay slightly more for the products we love and use DAILY, but for the most part I don't see this is "price gouging" and "trying to squeeze their loyal customers for every cent", but rather a necessary and JUSTIFIABLE price increase based solely on the cost of doing business and the rising price of EVERYTHING in a fortunately growing economy.
