It only matters if the rivals have same performance. Opus pricing is 50x Deepseek, and like >100x of small models. It should match rival if the performance is same, and if they can produce model with 10x lower token usage, they can charge 10x.
Gemini increased the same Flash's price by something like 5x IIRC when it got better.
I bet that the actual "performance" of all the top-tier providers is so similar, that branding has bigger impact on if you think Claude or ChatGPT peforms better.
I don't know if "performance" is relevant in this context, where these "tools" are marketed to non-technical developers (read: "vibe coders") who are by definition unable to verify the quality of the code produced by their LLMs;
I think branding is the entire game.
My illiterate, LLM-addict cousin is convinced that Claude is the answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe, and everything.
Criticisms of the code he (read: Claude) generates are not relevant to him -- Claude is the most intelligent being to ever exist, therefore, to critique its output is a naive waste of breath.
Gemini increased the same Flash's price by something like 5x IIRC when it got better.