Lower-Income Buyers Snatch Up iPhones

Increasingly, consumers are turning to the iPhone for music, Web browsing and calls
By Jim O'Neill,  Newser Staff
Posted Oct 30, 2008 8:00 AM CDT
Lower-Income Buyers Snatch Up iPhones
A man uses his iPhone in Moscow, Friday, July 18, 2008.   (AP Photo/Sergey Ponomarev)

Lower-income households are snatching up iPhones at a faster rate than their more financially flush counterparts, reports the Wall Street Journal, potentially attracted by its multiple uses—and single fee. By relying on the “Swiss-Army knife kind of device” to make phone calls, listen to music, and access the Internet, consumers save on the cost of individual gadgets as well as broadband connections.

Households earning between $25,000 and $50,000 showed the largest percentage increase in iPhone ownership over the summer and also outstripped overall growth in mobile web browsing. But others attribute the boom to the iPhone's declining price tag: "You had this device that inspired gadget lust suddenly put within reach," said one professor.
(More mobile devices stories.)

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