The middle class has shrunk because more people have become rich. So it seems that today there are greater opportunities to sell expensive hardware, particularly since even the lower classes are (in absolute terms) richer than the middle class of the Apple II era.
http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2015/12/09/the-american-middl...
As for 5k products, like fancy drones, 3d printers or high end bicycles, was the apple II non-niche?