art is a luxury and not a need, a lot of us are adults with jobs who need to pay for food and groceries. im lucky enough to be well-off so my commission prices are relatively cheap for the quality, but basically youre not just paying for the art--

--you're paying to have the artist invest free time, energy (and sometimes supplies) into the product. basically if you think someone is overcharging there are plenty of other options out there

this is also why AI is SO bad because when you train an AI off of someone's art you're basically, in essence, robbing them. i don't buy commissions myself and they do get expensive but i hope this makes sense to you