Apple chief executive John Ternus unveiled the iPhone Duo in Cupertino on Wednesday and priced it at $1,999. That is the starting price, for 256 gigabytes. Apple charges $3,199 for the 2-terabyte model. Pre-orders open Friday 16 October and the phone ships Friday 23 October. Ternus called it "the most transformational change to iPhone since the original." Apple will also take it in installments: $83.29 a month for 24 months.
Zillow put the typical American asking rent at $1,948 in August, in its report of Tuesday 8 September, up 2.5 percent on the year. The phone now costs more than the roof.
The median full-time worker earned $1,251 a week in the second quarter, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported on Tuesday 21 July. Divide the phone by the paycheck: 1.6 weeks of work, 64 hours at $31.28 an hour, for the cheapest Duo. Before tax. The same worker gives 102 hours for the 2-terabyte version. Nobody at Apple said the word "affordable" on Wednesday, and nobody had to.
The phone is the tell. When the everyday thing costs what the roof costs, America is becoming unaffordable, and the week's other prices — the pump, the barrel, the factory gate and a president's own delivery date — say the same thing, below.
