Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is really sad. On the one hand, sure Apple should be able to make a cut on their app store, on the other hand, they shouldn't be allowed to force apps to do this sort of thing. This will only drive domain prices higher on iOS in order to compensate (in the case of Automattic). If I were in a position where Apple is forcing me to pay a 30% tax, I would literally add "30% Apple Tax" to the check out screen on top…
You would actually need to raise your original price 43% to cover Apple's 30%. And yeah I agree, I am surprised more Apps don't take this approach. But perhaps it is discouraged somehow.
I think it's primarily "discouraged" by, just, you know the market and basic economics. Think such a statement through: if a business could simply increase pricing 43% without losing anything, they'd just do it. Like, everywhere. There'd be no reason to leave tons of money on the table on any platform at all. But of course in reality raising prices at some point tends to depress sales more than what is gained from the rise, so maximizing revenue means finding the sweet spot of $/unit * unit# = total revenue. And buyers only react to the price they are charged, not the developer's margin. So presumably in general developers have already optimized their pricing, which means there is only limited room to increase it before it's not worth it. Obviously it's somewhat more complex than pricing 101, in reality user populations are not fully randomized samples of the general population. iOS users overall may be somewhat less price sensitive for example, many apps are not completely elastic or substitutable goods, and users who've bought into a given platform face barriers to leaving it. So there is some room for some devs to raise prices a bit, and of course they can't sell at a loss.
But most can't simply raise prices by nearly half without losing customers to competitors, or for that matter losing customers to their own free offerings (which themselves they deem necessary).