My reading of the comment wasn't that the problem is that people expect dinner to be $50+/plate, it's that people expect dates to be dinner, and $50+/plate.

The point is really that there's an expectation mismatch around costs that shrinks everyone's pool of daters.

For actual numbers in Canada, the Globe and Mail recently commissioned a survey showing about 47% of singles would not be willing to spend more than 50 CAD (36 usd) on a first date - and that 24% of singles think the man should pay, compared to 0.2% of singles thinking the woman should pay. So you can see the mismatch if you think about the Venn diagrams there.

Source: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/article-is-canada-facin...