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I find it fascinating that Wolfram Alpha provides absolutely no references for any of its information.

The author of the article makes comparisons of the costs of tangible goods to arrive at the 500k number.

And bizarre comparisons at that, since the luxury car market can hardly be expected to be consistent in any meaningful way from 1920 to 2009.

Technologically, not. Remember that a luxury car is more like a status symbol.

Yes, and since 1920 there have been changes in pretty much all the inputs to the luxury car price function, wealth distribution, production costs of pretty much everything, and what the Joneses that you're trying to keep ahead of can be expected to have being the ones that immediately come to mind.

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