I bought a $100 Motorola and plan to keep it until the battery isn't charging anymore. So if I can keep it for 5 years I think $20 per year is reasonable.
Comparing this to the iPhone it will save me $980 a year. That's a nice holiday with my family...
A $1000 iPhone you use 3 years is $333 a year. What is that, one days work as a developer?
Maybe that's what you meant by important?
This sounds better, but better doesn't make good.
That isn't true with many Android devices because of the poor track record of OS upgrades and support.
I work in technology. I have a family. This device is my communications platform, information conduit, photography device, GPS device, and on and on and on. This is the computing device I use for probably 50% of my time.
I also don't have a junk laptop. The things that matter to me I'm willing to not cheap out on. Even if an alternative offered 80% of the utility for "$20 per year", the last 20% would be easily worth it.
The phone is not even a junk phone:
https://www.motorola.com/us/products/moto-e-plus-gen-4
It's just not a premium "luxury" phone. I spend $45 per month on service and $170 for the device. My fiancée's phone is a $1000 Pixel, and it offers almost nothing more. Nothing that she actually uses anyway.
Personally, while I don't doubt that the Motorola works fine for you, I wouldn't even consider it since it doesn't run iOS. Or likely any up to date OS in 3-4 years.
I used Android from its inception with the HTC Magic and Dream. Nexus One, Nexus 4, 5, 6p, GS2, GS3, GS8, Motorola Glide somewhere in there. Lots of devices, over every Android version. From a full financial cost perspective (e.g. lifetime cost and then value when retired if I were selling them) virtually all of them cost me more than the iPhone of the days.
It was never about cost. Various platform benefits drew me, from a development perspective it enticed me, and it seemed right for the industry. Almost morally right.
With recent iOS versions, however, Apple has stolen many of the best features of Android (the notification system, how multitasking operates, intents, etc), while at the same time improving on the benefits they already have (a higher quality platform, better security, a better app ecosystem).
As Google started moving to their Pixel platform, continued to abandon 2 year old devices with disregard (my devices are always new, but from a utility perspective I like being able to safely give older devices to my children), Android lost me. Not to mention that it became the Samsung platform with a fringe of Google devices. I also seriously question Google's motives in providing a quality API for developers for things like computer learning and computational photography.
So there's a counterpoint. These devices are so important for our lives now than $1000 a year seems entirely reasonable.