Swordmaker, I will not answer your silly questions until you stop throwing out incomplete "facts" pulled out of some intestinal outlet, and start documenting them with neutral source references. That is, e.g. what five publishers? What is their market share of fiction? non fiction?
Why are some paper books several dollars higher than the ebook editions?
The present market share of the co-conspirator (and mastermind) of the scam is irrelevant, if Apple devises a circumvention to prevent all other present and future retailers, regardless of size, and obligates those five publishers to not negotiate contracts, ever, that might put Apple at a disadvantage. That walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, etc. Collusion and price-fixing by any other names.
If your "facts" are actually complete and true, why hasn't Amazon been sued by anyone? If Steve Jobs thought Amazon was violating any law, why the subterfuge and games to attempt to control not only Amazon, but also future competition by illegal means?
Try some new arguments. Those are getting stale, and make no sense at all.
Oh yes. Are you a shill for Apple? Forbes? Cnet? a publisher? A fanatic Applebot? What?
WHY? Simple... there are COSTS attached to printing (paper and ink, layout, typesetting, labor), shipping, stocking, handling. These do not exist (except for perhaps layout, but a lot of eBooks are just loaded into a template!) for eBooks. Pure and simple.