Matt,Please don't think I'm jumping down your throat, I'm just trying to correct the eternal perception (in a small way) that the hobby is out of touch and too expensive compared to the past. Many people don't know or have forgotten just how little annual income there was in the old days, and that $100 was a lot of money 60 years ago. Today, $100 is a full tank of gas (depending where you live).My grandfather, who lived through the Great Depression, said to my mother when she was a kid that he would consider himself a rich man when he could spend $5.00 without thinking about it (this would have been the 1950s). By the time the 1980s rolled around, he had upped it to $20.00. Today, what's $20? One meal with tax and tip at a chain restaurant.One other thing to consider about today's introduction-level trains is that online retail is so easy. Right now, 24-7, you can go buy cheap trains by the boxcar full. In the 1960s, you had to go to a hobby shop or dept. store which may or may not carry them. For second hand items, a train show or maybe a lucky yard sale would net you some goodies. Otherwise, you got nothing. Today, not only can you buy new right now, but used, too. Any new introducton-level trains also has to compete against all the legacy items still being sold online.
Paul3 Matt,Please don't think I'm jumping down your throat, I'm just trying to correct the eternal perception (in a small way) that the hobby is out of touch and too expensive compared to the past. Many people don't know or have forgotten just how little annual income there was in the old days, and that $100 was a lot of money 60 years ago.
Matt,Please don't think I'm jumping down your throat, I'm just trying to correct the eternal perception (in a small way) that the hobby is out of touch and too expensive compared to the past. Many people don't know or have forgotten just how little annual income there was in the old days, and that $100 was a lot of money 60 years ago.
Rich
Alton Junction
Deleted by Me.
Take Care!
Frank
SeeYou190 Some parts of it, like the front turn signals and the wheel covers are amazing. The woodgrain sides also look effectively well reproduced. However, that luggage rack looks terrible to me. -Rapido Image -Kevin
Some parts of it, like the front turn signals and the wheel covers are amazing. The woodgrain sides also look effectively well reproduced.
However, that luggage rack looks terrible to me.
-Rapido Image
-Kevin
So, then, we all agree. The hobby is getting more expensive.
Seriously, though, it is not so much attributable to inflation as it is to supply and demand. As a recent example, I was checking out, and in some cases bidding, on a baggage car for a passenger train on eBay. A few years ago, I was buying Walthers baggage cars for $20 to $30. Now, however, these baggage cars have been discontinued and hard to find even on eBay. A few sellers are asking as much as $120, and winning auction bids have been over $80. Ouch! That is expensive.
richhotrainNot to be overlooked is the fact that wages have not kept pace with inflation. So, in 1960 terms, it costs more today to buy a similar item than it did in 1960. In other words, disposable income buys less today than it did in 1960. That's why it seems like the hobby of model railroading has become more expensive over the last 60 years or so. It has because purchasing power has declined over the same period.
Returning to model railroading after 40 years and taking unconscionable liberties with the SP&S, Northern Pacific and Great Northern roads in the '40s and '50s.
"Inflation" (of the money supply, or due to rational expectation) is not the primary thing that kicked prices up since 1960. Bretton Woods fixed the dollar at 35 to the ounce of gold, with Roosevelt having put teeth in that by forbidding the hoi from owning bullion. When Nixon finally allowed the dollar to float in the early '70s, the nominal devaluation can be compared to the 'dollar price of gold'.
One thing this dramatically points up is the value of manufactured products, particularly consumer electronics, by comparison to what was marketed in the late '50s and early '60s. Model trains are no exception.