There’s a lot more to traditional wet shaving than just price, but for many, price is the big deciding factor. Safety razor blades work out to being 44x cheaper than Gillette Fusion5 blades (both as bulk buy items).
It’s true that a quality safety razor is going to set you back about US$45 for Merkur 34C, and a bit more if you want to buy say an Edwin Jagger DE89 and fit that with an iKon solid stainless-steel knurled handle. But these razors are going to last you a lifetime. For example, my father’s Gillette Fatboy razor which he used in the mid-1960’s, still works perfectly well today, 65 years later.
Safety razors come in an unlimited variety of types and styles to express any individual whim. I’ve found the Edwin Jagger DE89 heads to be quite good, and they will accommodate a number of different handles with the standard screw thread.
A key takeaway, though, too, is that there is a unique combination of skin type vs razor vs blade. So, the aggressiveness of the razor head needs to be paired with a blade that suites your skin type. It may sound daunting, but a Merkur 34C is a fairly mild razor, whilst the Edwin Jagger DE89 is a more medium aggressive razor. Blades such as the Feather brand are quite sharp (read less forgiving) than say the Astra Platinum which are smoother. If you can get one, it is well worth buying a sample pack of blades to try out with your razor, as you’ll be surprised to find that they will all give a slightly different shave.
See my webpage at https://gadgeteer.co.za/myotherinterests/traditional-wet-shaving/