Well, since everybody else is weighing in ...
I grew up in a knife shop. I've sold a few knives for my Dad, and a few of my own. I put together a knife or two a year still, just for my own entertainment and use.
I hardly ever bother to sell 'em, though, because the honest truth is that most people are cheapskates who don't want to pay what the materials are worth, let alone for the time and expertise a craftsman puts into something. I've given a couple to friends that were deploying, but I'm not giving them away to someone who just doesn't want to pay for them.
You see it in lots of things. Just surf the hobby boards for a day or two, and you'll see questions like this all the time: What's the cheapest xyz item I can use for abc task?
It's partly budget, and we all understand that, but it is also ludicrous to think that the cheapest thing out there that will do the job compares favorably with the product of purpose-built, top-end craftsmanship.
"Adequate" does not equate to "awesome".
I recently had an interesting experience that illustrates. I was at the shooting range with a friend. I had my adequate Bushnell spotting scope. Its job is to tell me where the bullet holes are on the target, and to help find deer. I picked up my friend's Leupold Gold Ring binoculars, which have a much lower magnification ratio than the spotting scope. Those binoculars are unreal. The optical clarity is just amazing to a guy who's never used anything of that quality.
Is it quantifiable? Can I measure the difference between them? I don't know, but I do know that when my friend offered me the use of those binoculars for my upcoming Coues hunt, I grabbed them and stuck them in my truck before he could change his mind. I may not even pack my spotting scope. It does pull things in closer than the binos, so maybe they will serve different purposes.
Riflescopes. People are always trying to cheap out on their optics. I understand. We all do. Quality is expensive, and budgets are usually hard to find flex room in. But the difference between a $50 scope and a $150 scope is huge. I have a Bushnell that came in a package with a rifle, and a Nikon Prostaff. The Bushnell is adequate - it does what it is designed to do, but ... the Nikon is demonstrably more clear, less tiring to sit behind, and adjusts more precisely. If you have the Bushnell zeroed, it will enable you to hit your target (unless you switch between magnification levels - shifting impact points), but you will have an easier time using the Nikon. Whether the difference between a $150 scope and a $1000 scope is as huge remains to be seen. I have used a Zeiss one time, and it was honestly a very impressive scope, but I did not have a less expensive scope with me to compare it to.
Purchasers of knives can fall into the same trap of price trumping quality, but there are caveats: you can get an adequate, sharp piece of steel that will cut for not much money. A typical SAK doesn't cost a lot, and will have highly polished blades that center in the channel, don't rub each other, and snap open and closed with authority. There is no reason to buy cheap junk when such things exist in the world - quality, not price, is the measure. Where you go from there depends on your usage level and your budget.
A $300 knife may be a tremendous cutter, an enduring and comforting companion, or an investment.
A bladesmith tests his blades, frequently to destruction. When he says "My knives can do ..." whatever he says, he's saying because he's done it. I have taken one of my father's blades on deployment, on training exercises, hunting, and every place imaginable. It has pried, chopped, cut, sliced, and, not to be too ugly about it, intimidated dangerous locals. *cue Crocodile Dundee: now that's a knife!
That is a $300 knife. And, considering where it's been and what it's done, it would have been cheap, at twice the price.
