I was really pissed at that too... I got both miner and botanist master tool for my own consumption but since haven't crafted much 3 star gear because I need my myth for atma books. So I tried selling my ferbelites, native golds, raw ruby, etc.
So 2 things that is really irritating:
- as you mention, crafters only need few ores to crafts the 3 stars so for every 1M they get from selling their 3 star item at the moment, less than 10K goes back to the gather that still spent a fortune melding his gear.
- because the 3 star item market is so expensive and in low demand, our ores don't sell... plus, only the HQ version sell since they're required to have a decent chance to HQ the end product.

So while I think the person in charge of the DoH design lead does a pretty good job making crafting an interesting and rewarding activity, the DoL lead just make Gathering dull, a time sink, and very unrewarding...