Okay, and now what if they're being built in China? Hmm? (actually doesn't change much at low volume, to be honest.)

Also, not saying that you take the profit margin down to nothing, but a $50k/year salary is actually pretty high (outside of the West Coast and metropolitan Northeast). Unless you live in those high-cost areas you won't starve or miss rent on a $25k salary.

Still, your article has a good point. There is vastly more to consider when pricing a product than just the cost per product. And there is more to getting funding than just the number on the crowdsfunding page. While the MOD-T for instance might have something around $250 in pledges, you can probably bet that they aren't relying on that for their costs, but instead using it as a metric to show to their parent comapny and possibly other investors.

This is where crowdfunding is important, as a tool to show real investors "this is how willing people are to buy our product on faith alone" to intice them to put the effort in to put it on store shelves where the real sales are to be made.

Unfortunately many KS and IGG players have this aversion to participating in big business. (understandable, people here are constantly taught that big business is somehow inherently evil) With that mindset, your article is perfectly accurate, unless they make that $900,000+ they won't make it for long on their own.