Perceived Worth

Photo by Arbron

There's a fun little story over on SmartPlanet which looks at the price of Apple products compared to the Apple share price.

The premise is simple: instead of buying the Apple product, what if you invested the retail price in Apple stock instead?

They have a couple of examples on their website but it's this one which stands out:

1997 Apple PowerBook G3 250:
$5,700 retail; $330,563 stock value today

This is ludicrous in a couple of ways. I'm nowhere near being an economist (despite the two years studying Accounting - they were a blur) but to have shares increase to 40 times their value in 13 years seems unsustainable. As is taking money out of the "real world" economy in order to invest in something so overpriced.

Secondly, of course, is the product itself. How many people spent that hard-earned $5,700 to covet the PowerBook for a few years, before consigning it to a shelf in the spare room? Apple are particularly good at manufacturing a perceived obsolescence in their products - just look at the comment under this photo in Flickr that I found.

I fear, though, that our economy is now built on this shoogly foundation - the perceived worth of both a company and its products, with no one truly understanding the real value of anything.