When you talk about the labor you put into an app, that is all very nice, but the consumer doesn't care... All that matters is what people are willing to pay. So maybe when you think about developing an app - decide on the price it will sell at and then focus on putting the effort into it that gets you there and no more.
Spot on, this seems like completely amateurish way of creating a pricing strategy. What's more - simplicity and minimalism of Clear works great on an iPhone, but doesn't translate so good to a Mac (yes, I've bought both versions). And, on top of that, iCloud sync - which should be a killer feature here - trully sucks.