I think part of what drove prices through the roof were lawsuits dealing with young children swallowing parts from models ...
That plus gas prices (shipping) as well as new insurance costs as model kit makers became liable for lawsuits brought by concerned parents over their children's safety. New lines had to open up for safety inspection, quality checking, ect ... minimum wage increased, thus increasing the base cost for the kits to be manufactured ... new literature had to be printed up and included to cover for liability insurance mandates, ect ...
It became a legal nightmare to provide model kits, in other words. Prices for EVERYTHING across the board have gone up several times over. Gas is just one ...
I remember back in the 90's, going to the gas station to get gas for lawn mowing ... 95 cents a gallon. A few years ago, gas was near 3 dollars a gallon nationwide. The costs to make and transport it had hardly changed, but the world freaking out over the middle east drove costs through the roof.
Think about the price for a gallon of milk over the same time period ... I remember $1.25 a gallon ... now it's near $3.29. Again, the costs to manufacture and transport it haven't changed much, why did the price go up 250%?
They call it "inflation" ... the tendency for costs to increase relative to value of goods received. The nations leaders are mistakenly thinking that increasing minimum wage will solve this issue .... or printing more money will solve that issue .... or making large nationwide chain corporations hire more people by cutting full time hours back to part time only so that more people at least have jobs ....
None of these solve the underlying issue behind it all. The value of the american dollar is falling because we are spending more than we make to make up for it. But nobody in our leadership wants to face that particular lion in the cage ... cutting back on military spending would probably save our finances in the long run, allowing us to pay off our national debt and stabilize prices across the board.
(Sorry if this feels like a political rant, it's just my personal take on things and why they are out of control. I didn't vote for either presidential candidate ... I feel that both of them were a choice of EXTREMELY BAD and WORSE THAN BAD.)