Exactly and most people don’t want to compromise. There are some people out there that are really strict on their finances who will compromise. Usually these people have quite a bit of money and that’s how they accumulate it by being so strict.I went through this exact dilemma 3 months ago. wanted bigger screen and 256 GB, the plus gave up far too much in terms of features I wanted vs. the pro max to be worth the saving.
Is the pro max freaking expensive? Sure. but my smartphone, like most people, has been the device I spend a huge amount of time on, and rely on for a huge amount of functionality day to day.
Password manager, authenticator, sms, email, voice, nav etc. for such a crucial device to my life, compromising on it is less attractive.
Most people in the USA in the range from poor to lower middle class are not going to worry about an extra $300 for their phone. Especially when you can finance it and the payments go with the phone bill.
May way of thinking is I only live once. If it’s a significant downgrade for a device I’m using on a daily basis, then I don’t see it as worth it. This being said I don’t see a big difference from the 60Hz LCD screen on my iPhone 7 to the 120Hz OLED screen on my iPhone 14 Pro Max. If it was paying for that upgrade for example, I wouldn’t do it. If Apple sold the Pro Max iPhone with a 60 Hz LCD screen for $100 cheaper I would buy it. Of course, counting battery life was the same.