This is an interesting thread Frank. Should HiFi gear be cheaper in real terms than it is?
Personally, I don't think much modern gear is particularly good value at all. In real terms, it's expensive and even much of the Chinese gear is overpriced for what it is. Take these little headphone "amplifiers" around US$400-$500 for example. They are an utter rip-off in my eyes. HiFi was so much better value in the past due to the massive economies of scale and Japanese efficiencies.
It's funny, I was thinking of doing an in depth comparison for ASR of three integrated amplifiers from the same manufacturer (Yamaha) that I happen to have floating around here, from 1977-8, 1992-5 and 2010-14. (CA-610, AX-570, AS-300). The CA-810 sold for just £155 (in the UK) back in 1978.
Speakers have become absolutely stupidly priced. At one end, you have cheap and cheerful little 6.5" 2 ways by the thousands offering nice little bedroom systems that, when coupled with a decent amplifier, you get some quite approachable sound. At the other end, you have US$10K-40K speakers that maybe are great, but again, extremely poor value for money. Consider what your NS1000M pair sold for. Even in 1991 I sold them for AU$3499 pair. Even the stupendous NS-1000X was AU$4999 pair. And they were the best speakers a company the size of Yamaha could produce. Even the Centenary NS-10000X were under AU$10K per pair.
Sony's most expensive (in '91) and extremely high performance TOTL pre/power pair was AU$4200 (1799+2399). Yamaha's TOTL pre/power pair was AU$4300 (2399+1899) and Pioneer's pair was $4200. (200/260/200 wpc). There was intense competition at the top end as well as the bottom from the Japanese. They were all bristling with features, build quality and operational functionality. Warranties were a minimum of three years (Sony ES and Pioneer) and Yamaha had 5 years. You are lucky to get 1 year now.
My opinion is we are not remotely in the second "Golden Age" of HiFi, despite what some others think. Instead of massive R&D budgets and enormous economies of scale, along with a limited number of manufacturers, we have disparate little garage outfits stuffing basic single function disposable PCBs in generic boxes. The big boys have long since given up on HiFi proper, so overall, it's more money for considerably less.
The current crop of Yamaha amplifiers may look pretty, but apart from the TOTL models, they are not a patch on products they produced decades ago. Sony, I just shake my head. Pioneer- gone essentially as far as real HiFi. Marantz, Denon, Onkyo in the same boat. It's up to the little upstart companies to scrape together a "range" of a few DACs and Headphone stages- basically picking up the crumbs under the table after the dinner guests have left.