> I remember buying one for my son a few years ago (M1 mini) and it was a few hundred; now we're up to $900 for the base model.

The base price of a mini has only gone up $200 from $699 in 2020 to $899 today, and for $699 you only got 8GB of RAM instead of 16. Yeah the price has gone up but not nearly as much as you seem to be remembering...

[0] https://theapplewiki.com/wiki/Mac_mini_(M1,_2020)

I guess I felt richer in 2020.