Do you have an example of a device priced at $300 with competitive hardware to the base iPhone 14, without bloatware subsidizing the cost of the device? I’d accept that generally iPhones are ~$100-200 above the price of devices with competitive hardware, but a current gen iPhone having $300 hardware? The specs are very similar to other devices in similar price ranges
Not to mention that iPhones are literally best in the world in terms of the SOC. No other phone in the world matches them. Saying "their hardware is on average 1-2 generations behind other devices on the market" shows how wrong that person is.