You do know it's the carriers for the most part are the ones dishing out big bucks to Apple for every iPhone sold. I saw an atricle were I believe Apple gets over $600 per iPhone sold from Att, Motorola was the next highest on the list they were getting $450 from Verizon for the Droid. I'd guess most other carriers are paying Apple around the same as Att is.
Apple isn't ripping use off we should all thank Apple because they set the bar for the price of the iPhone at $199, $299. If you remember before the iPhone 3G came out smartphones were $350 and up on contract. Now nobody sells a phone higher than the $299 on contact now days.
And this does effect some consumers because some of use are stockholders.