Lumia 521. It can regularly be had for $40 no contract.
(I also have a $5 Lumia 925. But that's from ATT stupidity and not a fair comparison.)
Paid around 500 euro for my then-new Note2.
What really infuriated me then, was that it cost more than twice as much as the groundbreaking Archos 5 IT I bought 3 years earlier.
50% more would have probably been defensible, for the higher res OLED screen and interchangeable battery, as well as the stylus and digitizer and baseband chip and camera. But then it only has half the flash storage.
So while I agree, that the markup is obscene, at the time it cost no more than a 4" smart phone of similar specifications, which is probably the very reason arbitrary prices can be asked for the hardware. Even then, the price differential is more around 10x if you're searching after the initial release price has worn off. And even then, you're not comparing a Mazda 3 with a Rolls Royce, but rather a scooter with a 7-series/S-class type limousine, to flesh out your car analogy. The Lumia has 5-year-old screen tech, lacks a number of technologies and is restricted by its memory and CPU specs.
To make a comparison in the PC world: Yes, you can get a netbook for around 200 dollar new, but there's a reason that a higher end laptop easily runs into the 4000.