Supply and Demand...
The more the end buyer is prepared to pay, the more the importer makes, the more the exporter makes, the more the original seller makes. Our willingness to pay more is what drives the importing business. A capping price for 'most' games is where the cost of used is approaching cost of new.
Our wiliness to pay more is based on lack of supply (and our current economic situation compared to the rest of the world).
How to drop the used machine price:
Play more pinball on location. Operators will buy more new pins. As the machines become aged, unreliable and get less play, operators will on sell them. With more supply in the local market, the cost of a container pin will be slightly more than the price of a local pin (truth is the prices of local and import will alway be almost same - one drives the other).
That is what the situation was like up until the about year 2000, where local operators were dumping pins and no longer buying replacements. So pins are only expensive here because we are paying for the lack of new purchases over the last 10+ years.
