Over on AA Speakers there are a couple of guys (doctors, at least one is an Ob/Gyn) debating (read bragging their asses off) about the merits of their new Wilson Audio X2 speakers. $125K per pair, plus tax and tip. Both apparently upgraded from their X1 speakers, which were on the order of $90K per pair.

Being the odd person that I am, and having found myself in odd circumstances over the years, I've had occasion to be lectured by doctors on the subject of their remuneration.

Invariably, the substance of their story is that with most health care consumed by the retired/older set, and the limits set by Medicare, they can barely make a living. One Ob/Gyn told me that the cost of his malpractice insurance was so high it barely made sense to go to work. Another one, a relative, told me that he’s getting out of medicine and going into medical administration where the real money is, because the hours are killing him and there’s no money in it. BTW, this is a rheumatologist – an arthritis doctor – you don’t work outside 9 to 5 or get emergency calls in the middle of the night if you’re a rheumatologist.

All of this is to say that, invariably, when the subject comes up these middle-aged physicians tell their tale of woe and lack of real revenue. Then you read about the same group of guys dropping 3-years pay for most well paid middle class people on a pair of speakers they “just had to have” once they heard them. Not that the pair they already had weren’t essentially the same thing already.

On the one hand, they tell you they make no real money. On the other, they spend $125,000 after tax, net, folding-money-in-your-pocket, for a pair of speakers. And instead of being sheepish about it, they brag to the world.

The same guys who, when they find out you have no insurance, charge you five times what insurance would have paid them, because that’s the non-insurance price. If you can't pay it, they'll turn you over to collectors and bankrupt you. Guess they have to get the money for speaker cables from someplace.

Are we any different, spending money on speaker stuff when we have to make $2 last 4 days? Or like yesterday, when I put the $500 co-pay for a month’s prescription at the pharmacy on a credit card? Does it make sense that I’m spending money fooling with stereo when I have those kinds of bills? Nope. But nonetheless we apparently are able to make some sort of schizophrenic judgment that lets us do these sorts of things to ourselves (and others).
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