To buy an iPhone or not to buy and iPhone?

I'm a 19 year old guy and I'd like to get an iPhone 5. I currently have a tracfone. I'm having trouble deciding if it's worth spending $2400 for two years of service. Tracfone currently costs me about $1200 for two years. In other words, my tracfone is half of Verizon's iPhone plan.

I'd really like one because I'm somewhat techhy, it'd have a lot of nice features, etc. (I'm not hardcore techhy or I'd get a galaxy. The rest of my family doesn't care about tech that much and thus thinks it's a bad idea. It's a luxury, yes so I don't NEED it but so are a lot of things we own.

Added (1). The issue here is the price of the contract.

Just buy a iPhone off Craigslist, so much cheaper! IPhones are always worth it but not buying them from the ripoff stores

But to be fair your current phone is only half the phone compared to the iphone 5! I would probably wait though until the next iphone comes out and then go with that one instead.