Whomever said Money Can't Buy You Happiness Obviously Didn't Have Enough Money. The same can be said for chips. If you can't afford the new prices then you blame slabbing, investors, coin dealers, baseball card collectors, etc, etc, etc.
Life is not always fair.....But at least in America you have a chance. If you want to dominate a hobby or want a level playing field, just collect chips from some third world country...I'm sure you could amass a great collection and no one would care if you slabed them or not.