A SaaS “price transparency” site at Capiche.com writes that “It’s not just you: software has gotten far more expensive,” citing their survey of 100 business applications.
Software prices went up 62% on average over the past decade — over three times faster than inflation, outpacing even rent and healthcare. Today’s iPhone XR, by comparison, costs 25% more than 2009’s iPhone 3GS (or 67% more if comparing the iPhone XS). Some apps went up far more drastically, though even if you removed the ones whose price went up more than 200%, software still on average went up 42% — or over double the average inflation rate… [I]f you paid $9.99 a month for business software in 2009, there’s a good chance you pay $16.18 for it today — if not $19.78.
Of the hundred business apps we surveyed, sixty-seven raised their prices an average of 98% in the decade between 2009 and 2019. Fourteen lowered their prices an average of 28%, and nineteen apps kept their prices the same… Notably, if the apps you used raised their prices, odds are their prices nearly doubled over the past decade. That’s perhaps even more noticeable than if all of your apps went up a few percent…
in an industry where we were long accustomed to getting more for less — an industry where that still holds for most physical products — software has gone up in price three times faster than inflation. That’s hard to ignore.
All of their data is available in a public spreadsheet on Google Sheets, and they ultimately argue that today free “most often a strategy, a means not an end. Apple gives away software to sell devices; Google gives away storage to get you to store more so you’ll upgrade.”
of this story at Slashdot.
Source:: Slashdot