I like Mercedes/BMW, and I drive a nice, very very old Mercedes. I think people presume too much about people driving BMW/Mercedes on this board. For me, I refuse to buy any Japanese product since Japanese killed 90% of my hometown in WW2, and to this day, is still pretending it has never happened. When just about every friend you have lost one or both of their grandparents to Japanese war crime, it certainly changes your world view quite a bit. I realize this is not a political forum, so I will stop here.
Regarding income, I think average salary for engineers has increased quite a bit over the past 4 to 5 years. 5 years again, when I first started at USC PhD program, the average salary for fresh PhD in EE is around 80 to 90k. Today, it is around 120k to 140k. So a two income family with two PhDs (as many new Chinese/Indian immigrant families are), should have a family income between 240 to 300k. This does not mean average income in TR is that high of course (I have no idea the average TR income is, anyone know) or the price in TR is justified