The us median income for fulltime in 2016 is 44k a year for people above 25 years. A tad bigger for men vs woman.I earn about $14k per year (converted), this effectively puts any single component more expensive than $300ish outside of the range of affordability excluding exceptional circumstances.
It's important to remember than $100k salaries are not the norm in the rest of the world, even for people who are computer professionals.
For people with an advanced degree - master - the median income is 75k.
Bachelors is in between.
Its far fetched to think AT readers in general is in the top 5%.
And i mean look at us prices including skl x and ryzen. Intel or amd obviously cant charge higher prices or they would do so.
I will gladly come back to this 100k sallery bs the day amd launches some 7nm fx99 5.5GHz 12c zen 2 at 1499 usd that walks all over a core i7. I think imaginary 100k AT forum sallery and the meaning of 15% st perf will change a lot that day for some people.