But is the higher price necessary or an artificial segmentation of the market? Of course expensive sounds better than cheap, but could $100 headphones sound as good as $500 or are they really that much more expensive to make?
I doubt it - there is plenty of competition in that market. I bought some "no-name" chinese open ears for 50$ with supposedly good drivers - had decent reviews saying they sound above their price - you just needed to replace the horrible ear pads they were decent. But for example my 200$ DT990 are obviously a class above.