Yes the prices were the wrong way round in that quote and have been corrected. As to the rest... Frankly you baffle me. Very few hardbacks sell for less than the ebook. Only special supermarket promotions of a handful of titles.  I don't see what's 'insulting' about pointing out that ebooks are already cheaper than physical ones and that book prices generally are a fraction of what they were. Authors don't set book prices by the way. Retailers do mostly these days. 

Nor do I think there's any evidence this very cheap pricing system is broken. If it were how come Amazon are selling more ebooks than printed ones? People are paying in their millions which according to your logic (and I agree) must mean the price is right. People steal books because it's easy not because of price. Those 99p ebook specials are on the torrents too. 

Sent from my iPad