[Elecraft] Competition coming for Elecraft?

[n2ey at aol.com]

 One thought about rig prices (like $3000+ for an Orion, $6000 for a Sienna, etc.): Inflation.
 
Back in 1958, a bare-bones (no extra filters, no reduction tuning knob) Collins 75A-4 cost $695 IIRC. I dunno what that equates to in 2005 dollars, but I bet it's more than $3000. And the 75A-4 was just a ham-bands-only *receiver* that couldn't even transceive! 
 
A nice new car back then was what - $2000? A nice suburban house was maybe $30,000. Etc.
 
And a family with an income of $10,000/yr was definitely upper middle class. Most people got by on much less.
 
When Collins came out with the S-line, about 45 years ago, a KWM-2 was $1095 or thereabouts. A 75S-1/32S-1 combo was even more money - $1400? Yet there was a market for such rigs even though the number of hams then was a fraction of what it is today. 
 
To me it's simply amazing that the hams of yesteryear could afford some of the rigs they had. 
 
73 de Jim, N2EY