Not to mention this whole society which expects everything for free has made it very hard for a small company to get into the market and innovate.

If you think about how much money you can make from a professional tool and how much productivity it gains you then the price should be a no brainier.

Offtopic: I would also urge you if you want to solder not to buy a cheap soldering iron from radioshack, etc. If you don't have the money for a weller or hakko soldering station then at the very least buy a chinese temperature controlled hakko 936 clone. The difference between a crap iron and a decent temperature controlled iron is gigantic.

Except that your grandpa didn't have to pay a monthly subscription for his hammer. I really dislike the subscription model for tools.

How did he feel about perpetually renting them? Even if the tool is currently perfect, I don't trust that the company's future plans will align with my future needs; I expect that they'll diverge.

edit: I stand corrected; didn't see the asterisk and the separate page specifying that an active subscription isn't necessary to continue using the current version of the software.

You have to buy a personal license yourself, your organization cannot pay for it. I just don't want to pay for work tools, my employer should do that and then it is the higher price.