Apologies for not answering sooner - I had detoxed from HN for a few days.

Further apologies for not making it abundantly clear that I'm on your side on the topic that professional musicians deserve to be paid like any other profession including programmers.

So inadvertently my GP post probably come across as disputing your right to earn money with your music. That's the opposite of what I was trying to say.

My post was more an (obviously misfired) attempt to guide the argument away from the equipment and distribution expenditures side of making professional calibre music - since that's trending significantly lower and lower compared to the 70s and 80s. Therefore I believe professional musicians are doing themselves less and less favours by mentioning that argument.

I think the more successful leading argument would be the investment of talent and time. To me talent is a continuing valid argument, since as a music consumer I hate to lose the most talented musicians to being average in some other profession at the cost of them not developing that talent to the best it can be, and to publish their work for the benefit of larger society (including me). -- I'd also hate so lose the most talented programmers to other professions etc.).

And to maximize their musical talent, that talented individual needs to have the time and energy to invest by getting paid for making music. The required cost of gear only adds to that need, but I'd say that your time and energy is much, much more valuable than your gear with today's equipment. For example over 5 years, I'd say your time should be at the very least 5 to 10 times more valuable than your gear - quite possibly more. (That ratio was very different in the 70s and 80s with lower cost of living and higher equipment and distribution costs).

And hell yes, you should get paid - and my heart bleeds for you and so many other high caliber musicians, who are finding it increasingly difficult to make even a modest living with creating outstanding music.

p.s. I can't profess to be knowledgeable about your arm of the professional music business. I have however reasonably deep familiarity with other parts (assuming your definition of a professional musician would also include those parts). For what it's worth, I count a sibling, a sibling-in-law, and a nephew as current full-time professional musicians in performing live, producing, arranging, musical direction and such. And we are close, so therefore talk a lot. And it may not count anymore, but I also made my living with playing live music for a while before bailing out to become a software developer. Which in turn over the years funded my reasonably nice home studio - so I know the costs of acquisition, maintenance and continued upgrades quite intimately.

Agreed, I can become a developer for quite a bit less money in gear - but as I said above, the equipment cost pales to a rather small percentage in comparison to the time and energy investment while needing to eat, while keeping dry and warm/cool, and even more so when you're trying to support a family.

But above all: My very best wishes to you in trying to survive and hopefully find or continue your niche to thrive in the generally grim environment facing professional musicians - only made worse by the pandemic.