Absolutely not, and I think your idea of global and local market conditions are completely unfounded. "Rich Americans" don't subsidize the rest of the world.
An example for this particular setting: I'm from Brazil where a copy of this book simply does not exist. It needs to be imported, which will be the precise price of the book in dollars, converted to reais, plus shipping and the local library's fee (if you don't buy from Amazon).
If I could buy a copy of it for R$50 I would right now. But as it stands it'd cost me ~R$200 for a new copy. People who don't have that kind of money to spend on a technical book are simply priced out of knowledge.
> I doubt Bertrand makes that much money on being an author (who does?)
I agree, he probably gets a very small percentage.
But he's not just an author, he's a PhD professor and a software consultant. Writing books isn't his only job and he probably makes more money in a single year of his other activities than he did in the sale of all of his books combined. If we were talking about someone who is a pure writer I'd agree somewhat. But if he wasn't a professor and a software consultant he would never have written that book, so it's just an offshoot of his other professional activities.
> We should respect property rights, we don't have to buy it unless we are Dr. Meyers students.
We don't have to buy anything. Not even his students do. But if we want to acquire knowledge we must. The point is, to those who are producing this knowledge, do you want to enhance people's intellect or do you want to make money? If it's the latter, and you are already handsomely paid, I won't shed a tear when your intellectual property rights are ignored.
I wouldn't have a problem if it wasn't him, personally, complaining.