Randy has a point. With the "audiophile" discourse being dominated by stratospherically priced items, why does anybody wonder that there are few young people coming in?
He also has a point that at best marginally better sounding items in the 10K and up range, per component, nota bene, are considered entry level for "audiophile" systems. This is normalized by the general awareness of the ridiculously priced items.
And while in the 1970s the differences between a 0.1/1/10K electronics component were more pronounced, nowadays the differences are much less. Differences in recording styles (assuming same quality) is greater than differences in component sound. Yes, I tested that with $250 vs $5K DAC.
I for one would welcome if discussions, magazine articles and audio show would reflect the actual market place in terms of units moved. Lots of <1K components, a decent selection of 1-10K, and above 10K very little. Maybe one item above 100K. The endless 1M system rooms are both tiring as they are offensive, and typically are not sounding great anyway.
Of course, everybody can spend money on whatever they want. I prefer doing it on a variety of music that I play on a midlevel system (see my virtual system).
@gdaddy1 We installed hardwood floors throughout the house, and the music room has a carpet over the wood floor. plus furniture for sound treatment, and selected panels (DYI, btw).