Hacking the Backyard Chicken Monopoly

I'm not sure if it's the same in the rest of the world, but here in my little corner of Australia I've come across something alarming...for anyone who wants to buy heritage breeds the going rate (Australian dollar) per dozen eggs is $60-80, and going rate per pullet is ~$65. That's not show quality either, which are going for $150/dozen eggs. Is that reasonable? When all the costs are put together is that the actual value of it all? Are all the folks who want a couple chickens in their backyard just getting duped? Or should I just close my mouth, find some good quality heritage breeds, and jump on the bandwagon?

A lot of my reaction I suppose comes from purchasing chicks in Vancouver 10 years ago when I was getting 3 day old purebred heritage breeds for $5 each from local farms (CAD and AUS were on par then as a reference, but of course that was all pre covid and all that too). I mean...in our area now, you can purchase a calf for the same price as purchasing a pullet :/ Is this just the new world we live in? Interested to know other folks thoughts from a Permaculture perspective!

Maybe it's like with fancy dog/cat breeds? I'm always suspicious when something is expensive. Maybe it means that it needs a lot of care, is very fragile, or so rare that gene pool is tiny (which can lead to long term general health problems).
When I'm new to something (like aquaculture, recently) I'm looking what plants and animals are advertised for free / very cheap, and trying to figure out why (excluding the free "up for adoption" thing, because that's another story). Usually these are sturdy healthy landrace genetics, which can thrive easily without much care. Maybe I would prefer this kind of chicken (and then pamper them of course).

On the other hand, a fishy story: I recently bought a local native variety of carassius, which is believed to be very healthy and sturdy, but turned out that mine were from horrible conditions and died, despite all the efforts to save them. So I got a fancy colour variety, because these were from a better source (breeders cared about them because they knew that pet / ornamental pond owners will rather buy fish that looks healthy and pretty). They are still a sturdy species and maybe I will find better sources over time.