Looked at lasers the other day. Least priced I could find was nearly $200 and it was B&W with no scanner for copying. Color with a scanner was higher. I can buy a new Ink Jet every couple of years and cartridges in between for that price.
Back on topic ... sort of..... I was looking for cartridges to compare to the big box office store. Same exat part number was comparably priced with the occasional 'deal'. One seller had a slightly better version ('XL' whatever that means) for a slightly lower price. I might have gone with that one but the shipping was going to be a week or so. Normally that would have been fine and I would have waited. But I was going to town anyways and I found an extra coupon for the big box office store, so it worked out better that way this time.
BUT .... I also found a bunch of sellers listing 'Setup' cartridges; the ones that come with printers ... the ones that are only partially full. I'm not aware that you can buy those separately. It appeared to me they were buying printers with cartridges, opening them, removing the cartridges and selling them without the printers for nearly the price of the fully filled versions. I didn't check to see if they were also selling the (now scavenged) printers as well.