MRT2 seems to think that good entry level bikes should cost less simply because he
thinks they should. I'm not sure that is how it works.
MRT2 even identifies, in his first post, some factors that may be driving costs (and hence prices) up right now, but seems to have already forgotten about them. Even though such factors have been widely reported and discussed here at bf.
A few of us have given counterexamples, but they seem to have gone unnoticed.
I'm recalling Microeconomics 201: if a market is reasonably competitive (and as I explained above in post #5, the new bike market does meet the description), then prices will not rise to extraordinary levels (relative to production cost) for long - because of
competition.
But instead of using solid theory and empiricism, I guess it's more fun to pin it on greedy capitalists.
Carry on.