Uh... I don't really get this. Why not lower the price for everyone and get a better rep among customers?
I mean if Tesla wants to have lifelong customers that's where you start. But then again they seem to be going into the marketing of their tech so maybe not.
Because this is the price required to make the profit they wanted to make on the 60kWh option.
The fact that some cheap low performance version turned out to be infeasible because customers prefer expensive high performance version doesn't mean that you should (or could) reduce price of the expensive version.
Furthermore, some owners of crippled 60kWh units will probably end up paying for "upgrade" to 60kWh. In the end these units will sell for full 60kWh price even though the buyers initially wanted 45kWh version.
To be honest, I've always suspected that the 40 kWh was more about marketing than about actually releasing a commercially viable option - they wanted to hit the price point Elon Musk had announced on his roadmap several years earlier, but they couldn't produce a product the market actually wanted at such a low price. It might even be a slight loss leader.
I mean if Tesla wants to have lifelong customers that's where you start. But then again they seem to be going into the marketing of their tech so maybe not.