I think a contributing factor in the rarity and high price of low/low-mid rank gear on the market is that it takes like what? 8 or 10 hours to go from r20 to 30 as a DoW/M? For goods with such limited windows of use, it just doesn't make sense to cater to that market when you've got 20 slots total that you could stock with more profitable/in-demand items.

I don't see how saturating the market with low priced materials would turn around that situation.