Mid-engined layouts are just a pain to do maintenance on, generally offer reduced cargo space and interior room.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e7/19...
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/34/Fe...
They build 3,500 of 'em per year. That's very high compared to say, any given Ferrari or Lamborghini model.
http://mediaroom.kbb.com/record-new-car-transaction-prices-r...
In EU, a Volkswagen Golf for instance is middle segment, but perhaps in the USA is considered lower segment and therefore the difference.
Small cars do not really sell here.
(For reference, I actually bought a new VW Golf R about 2 weeks ago... for roughly $41,000, just as a single data point).
In my case, the price premium isn't really that much to even think of, as I would have been going with a fully loaded GTI, which would have sticked around $35k or so, so it's not even _that_ much of a price bump.