The antennas have always done all the important work. I'd much rather have a 20+ year-old IC-740 connected to beams on towers than a brand-new $3000 do-everything gizmo connected to verticals and wires. No comparison in what you can work -- but it's always been that way.
I think ham gear costs less today than it ever has, adjusting for inflation. You can't compare a used $500 IC-740 to a new IC-746PRO. One was used, the other isn't. A used IC-746, which is very feature-rich, will outperform the IC-740 in most ways, and includes 6m and 2m besides the HF bands (and an automatic antenna tuner to boot) can be purchased for $700 right now, today...only $200 more for a rig that's better in almost every way, not to mention 20 years newer. Not bad.
In the mid-60's when I was first licensed, a new transceiver that covered only five bands (80-40-20-15-10m) and didn't work nearly as well as most modern gear cost about $599 and used lots of tubes. Most of those rigs suffered mortalities after only about three or four years of operation, due to tube and heat issues. Adjusting for inflation from 1966 to 2003, the 1966 $599 rig would cost about $5995 today (yes, inflation over the past 38 years has been approximately 10x, if you go by the cost of living index).
But antennas are really what's important, and their cost has barely changed over time. A new Telrex 20M317 twenty meter, 3-element monobander in 1966 cost $300. A brand new 20M 3-element monobander today also costs about $300. Virtually zero change, over a period where the CLI has increased 10x. Now, *that's* a deal!
WB2WIK/6