"Blackstone is not happy with Leica"

[Huss]

You can believe inflation statistics - but they are fairly meaningless when it comes to evolving products. It is easy to track the value of bread or milk across time. But what was the price of a flatscreen TV, digital camera or portable computer in the mid fifties?

Except my point was made comparing the M3 with the M-A. The M-A is not a digital camera, but essentially a lower quality copy of the M3!
And yet it cost almost 90% more after the price is adjusted for inflation !!!

 

[sevo]

Except my point was made comparing the M3 with the M-A. The M-A is not a digital camera, but essentially a lower quality copy of the M3!
And yet it cost almost 90% more after the price is adjusted for inflation !!!

Absolutely! But my point was that the inflation-independent price of a M-A cannot be determined in relation to the inflation scale when it belongs to a difficult class of devices where there is no linear development and entirely new things still get invented. The M series grew out of any type of realistic, comparable pricing by the early seventies - anything that happened after that is, if any, proportional to collectibles pricing (which has ups and downs for entirely different reasons and mechanisms).

 

[leicapixie]

i Love Film.
I Love my Leica M's.
Selling a Film Leica is a problem..
It will run for about 50+ years with some services..
Mine have!:angel:
A Digital so far, requires "upgrading" or replacing every few years.
A Leica MA will outlast any Digital M.
Unless a lot of younger folk, i mean a lot, it's gonna be a hard sell.
The "smartphone" and tablet are fast becoming the main way.
I do not use a cell/mobile.😀

 

[Roger Hicks]

Absolutely! But my point was that the inflation-independent price of a M-A cannot be determined in relation to the inflation scale when it belongs to a difficult class of devices where there is no linear development and entirely new things still get invented. The M series grew out of any type of realistic, comparable pricing by the early seventies - anything that happened after that is, if any, proportional to collectibles pricing (which has ups and downs for entirely different reasons and mechanisms).

Sure, but this requires a modest degree of intelligence to understand. Why haven't Leicas decreased in (inflation-adjusted) price the same way as portable radios? Same answer.

Cheers,

R.

 

[noisycheese]

This just in from the redoubtable Herr Puts:

https://www.facebook.com/erwinputs/posts/821040281302087

 

[Huss]

Sure, but this requires a modest degree of intelligence to understand. Why haven't Leicas decreased in (inflation-adjusted) price the same way as portable radios? Same answer.

Cheers,

R.

That is a little bit insulting Roger. I expected better.

Your point - portable radios dropped in price because they became cheaper to make and were made cheaper.
The M-A is made cheaper than the M3 (it has a lower spec rangefinder lower quality mechanisms etc) but has it also become cheaper to make?

How about accounting for what used to be an annual price hike on the lenses, even though they often were the exact same lenses?

Simply put, the birds have come home to roost.

 

[Roger Hicks]

That is a little bit insulting Roger. I expected better.

Your point - portable radios dropped in price because they became cheaper to make and were made cheaper.
The M-A is made cheaper than the M3 (it has a lower spec rangefinder lower quality mechanisms etc) but has it also become cheaper to make?

How about accounting for what used to be an annual price hike on the lenses, even though they often were the exact same lenses?

Simply put, the birds have come home to roost.

Expect to your heart's content.

Something that's made by expensive skilled labour for a small market is not going to decrease in price to anything like the same extent to something that is assembled by machine, using vastly cheaper integrated circuits, fir a huge consumer market. Add in the truth that the skilled labour in question got decent pay-rises, because they weren't being screwed down by cheap Chinese competition.Then add in currency fluctuations -- even with recent recoveries the dollar is about $1.11 to the euro, as compared with better than $1.00/euro at its best, and something like $1.30 or even $1.35 at worst (from painful memory) and it really does not require much intelligence to see why Leicas cost what they do in the United States. Or why they went up.

Cheers,

R.