[ssalazar]

Many people who get into software development before 2010 or so have easily spent hundreds of dollars on dev tools of a similar nature.

[markerz]

Surely, they don't spend $500 per month, though, as the quote implies.

[daemin]

Visual Studio Professional did cost about $500 back in the day, although you ended up getting a perpetual licence for the software and some updates. These days they expect you to have a subscription as with all other business software.