A few reasons: legacy code in research (often headed by older staff), Matlab's speed out of the box, use in industry (Toyota), and toolboxes developed by Mathwo

A few reasons: legacy code in research (often headed by older staff), Matlab's speed out of the box, use in industry (Toyota), and toolboxes developed by Mathworks itself. For those who don't want to resort to piracy when doing "home work", Octave is a really good alternative for less complex scripts.