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Old 22nd May 2021, 09:51 AM
John King John King is online now
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No it is not 'Go Compare' or any of the others, it is me getting bored.

I found an inflation comparison calculator on the web and thought "I wonder"? Then from a page detached from a copy of the Amateur Photographer dated September 1963 which I found when clearing the loft out a few weeks ago I found these prices:-

The price of a 35mm 36exp FP3 (there was no FP4 then) was about 25p per cassette. Today the same with FP4+ should cost about £5.37 so not a lot of difference there depending where you buy from.

Going up a notch, the price of a 36 exp Kodachrome (only 10ISO then) was about £1.50 including processing, today we would be paying around £32.27!!! (no lens

A New Leica M2 body was £125.00 today it would be around £2685.00 including taxes

A new M(.72) body today is according to the Leica dealers, Red Dot Cameras, is advertised on their website is £4000 exactly, in 1963 it would have been around £186 after conversion.

Oh yes, the price of the AP was shown as 1/3p or about 5.25p converted. I wish I still had the rest of the magazine there were bound to be a lot of other comparisons.

And another, I was being paid around £4.25 a week as a 17 year old (44 hrs) if that was now it would be about £92. So really we are generally a bit better off financially.

Last edited by John King; 22nd May 2021 at 09:58 AM.
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Old 22nd May 2021, 11:27 AM
Mike O'Pray Mike O'Pray is offline
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Yes I think there is little doubt that our disposable income goes further now and when I picked up a couple of photo mags from the mid 1950s I discovered that most things to do with photography needed even more of the then current wage

The problem I suffer from is that there did appear to be "window of relative cheapness" that began shortly after I started photography in a serious way in 2003 It lasted until after the financial crisis of 2008/9 when things photographic rose above inflation then settled down again for 2-3 years and recently has risen markedly again, at least in terms of film prices.

It is sudden rises that are much larger than inflation that sticks in our memories and temporarily at least tend to govern our outlook on how expensive our hobby is.

I feel we are creatures governed by short-term shocks to a large extent. Taking the long view is difficult

Having said all of this I do feel that colour film has risen in price quite dramatically and it remains to be seen if it will ever come down in price(unlikely I feel) or at least stabilise for a few years while our disposable incomes catch up

Mike
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Old 22nd May 2021, 01:13 PM
John King John King is online now
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That rule of thumb using the rate of inflation just goes out of the window when you think of house prices.

My parents bought their first house in 1954 for £700, a large mid 19th C terraced house with real character, which probably had not been seriously updated for half a century when electricity was installed.

My mother sold it in 1973, for £4750, admittedly it still needed a vast amount of work doing on it. It was sold again in 2010, the same house, not extended, but a fully restored 4/5 bedroom 2 large reception rooms and it went for £735,590.

No wonder the young cannot get on the property ladder.
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