"The $170 premium for the EVGA is somewhat expected given its higher GPU clock, iCX3 cooling technology, metal backplate and abundance of RGB lighting."
As a long time EVGA buyer, you also pay for their industry leading customer support. I only had to use it once with a failing GTX 970 which was no longer available (I had 2 in SLI), and after verifying the card went bad after I sent it to them, they gave me a $300 credit towards a new purchase which I bought a 1080 Ti with (my SC model cards originally were $339 a piece). The whole process took less than two weeks between reporting the failure and getting my discounted 1080 Ti.
Right,,, and in 1955 you could buy a new Volkswagen for $999.
People just don't get it. GPUs have grown in both importance and power in a gaming rig, and with every higher resolution monitor launch, it requires a more powerful GPU. In the old days, we'd just add a second card for SLI or Crossfire for that. But that ship sailed years ago. Everything now is a single GPU solution for game developers (you can thank consoles for that starting with the PS3 and XB), and if you want to play with the eye candy and high resolutions while hitting at least 60FPS - or the more recent trend of faster 120-240Hz monitors at lower resolutions matching that FPS - you'll have to pay. Prior to my $749 1080 Ti the most I ever paid was $539 for a 2GB 680. That 680 was a regrettable purchase with the longevity span of a gnat in computer relevance as I moved up to my first 2560x1440 monitor. My two 970s in SLI cost more than that 1080 Ti but didn't have the performance at higher resolutions where VRAM matters (and yes, I filed for and got the $30/per card refund from the Nvidia lawsuit).
^^And Jacob essentially states the same thing, and is correct.
But back to card prices, today's $330 EVGA 8GB RTX 3060 XC Gaming wrecks the $499 Founder's Edition RTX 2070 or the $459 reference RTX 1070 Ti. The $749 RTX 3080 wipes the floor of the $1,100 RTX 2080 Ti just as an example of relevance with each new generation, their tiers, and their respective price points .