Even going back several years, the gf2 Ultra when it hit market was probably a little more then the 7800 is now on release when adjusted for inflation. Back then, your alternative choices were limited to a much inferior voodoo. It took a pretty long while before the gf2 TI value hit market that gave close to ultra performance for a lower cost.
Things are much cheaper now because toned down versions of top end cards are hitting market fast. The 9500 pro you mention was a toned down version of the 9700 pro, which cost a good $550. There was also competition on market on that generation from Nvidia.
We are only into day 2 of the initial release of the 7800 and there is no competition on market yet for the generation, so of course the card will be at a premium price point. In a few months, the R520 will be on market and you'll see toned down versions of both cards priced to stay within certain ranges. What will probably happen is the ATI card will be faster and Nvidia will release a 520 meg, 32 pipe version of the 7800 that will be their top end priced card, making the current 7800 a mid to low end card and priced in the $200 range, and probably pretty quickly.
Even for the total budget gamer, the choices today are far better then any time in the past. I got my A64 PCIe MB for under $70, a 10000 rpm raptor HD for $70, single A64 CPUs are cheap and I got a vanilla refurbed 6600 for $60. This $60 card OCs stable to 550/700 and plays any new game much better then any similarly priced vid card would a few years ago.
The only way to make a fair comparision to the 9500 pro is to wait about 6 more months.