Cost plus was never a pricing model differentiated goods. Human psychology just doesn’t work that way; nobody says “having a nice reliable car is worth $20k to

Cost plus was never a pricing model differentiated goods. Human psychology just doesn’t work that way; nobody says “having a nice reliable car is worth $20k to me, but I’ll pay $30k because their cost to produce is high”. That’s kind of the whole point of the capitalist / consumerist model: first movers take high risks with investment and can reap outsized returns if successful, while success breeds competition from new entrants who have a proven market and a product to copy. The expansion of the market means more price competition, driving prices and returns down. I’m not saying it always works like that, just that it generally does.