The subscription economy

Editor’s note: This article first appeared in Money Matters, a newsletter from Britannica Money, on September 13, 2026.

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Convenience has turned a lot of things we once bought into monthly payments.

© donatas1205, ARAMYAN, aopsan/stock.adobe.com; Photo illustration Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.

Boston’s first album. I’ve at times called it my favorite of all time—and it’s definitely in my top five—but here’s its real distinction (in my mind, anyway). It’s the one album that, at one point or another, I owned on vinyl, cassette, CD, MP3, and, I’ll admit it, 8-track. And now I rent it—along with pretty much the entire catalog of recorded music—from Spotify for $12.99 a month.

I hate to think of all the money I’ve spent buying the same music in different formats. But at the same time, I love it. Streaming finally delivered what we consumers have been trying to cobble together for decades: my music, wherever I am, without carrying the physical stuff.

In today’s economy, we’re inundated with opportunities to trade ownership for convenience. Sometimes it makes sense. Sometimes we pay more for the privilege. And sometimes we keep paying long after we’ve stopped asking whether it’s still worth it.

Housing is the obvious example. When you’re starting out—or simply don’t want the cost and responsibility of homeownership—renting gives you a place to live without coming up with a down payment or committing to the same city or neighborhood for years.

Other things practically beg to be shared. A public library may be one of the oldest successful examples of shared access, and digital lending has made the library model even more convenient. A gym membership works much the same way: For a monthly fee, you get access to thousands of dollars’ worth of equipment, and somebody else gets to maintain it.

And then there are ideas that make perfect sense on paper but can get messy in practice. The timeshare pitch sounds great: Split the cost of a vacation property with a bunch of other people who use it for a week or two each year. But maintenance fees, restrictions, availability, and a notoriously lousy resale market can turn the cost of access into a headache.

Good deal or bad, the underlying appeal is the same: Give up some of the benefits of ownership in exchange for lower up-front costs, less responsibility, and/or greater convenience. Whether that’s a good trade depends on the terms—and how much you actually use what you’re paying for.

The basic trade-off between ownership and access has been around forever, but digital technology was the game changer. The Internet made it possible to sign up, pay, use, and upgrade without ever setting foot in a store—or, increasingly, taking possession of anything at all.

Netflix is a great example. Its original subscription service mailed DVDs to our house, and I never again saw the inside of a Blockbuster Video. And then broadband replaced the DVD and the mailbox. Now that the streamers produce a lot of their own content, I rarely go to the movies anymore.

Convenience continues to solve problems—sometimes problems we didn’t know we had. But it’s made recurring payments super-easy to accumulate.

All that convenience gives us more choices, but that doesn’t necessarily make the decision easier—or less expensive. Before you buy something, rent it, sign up for a subscription, or decide you don’t need it at all, ask yourself three questions:

The subscription economy works best when the trade is clear: You give up ownership, but in return you get convenience, flexibility, and access—and you can walk away when the deal no longer works for you. For a lot of things, that’s a trade I’m happy to make. 

But ownership will never die. In fact, it’s become a choice again. My son recently rediscovered the magic of vinyl. He’s got a new turntable and an expanding collection of records, including that same Boston album I gave away a few decades ago. Go figure.