Well it sounds like I'm not totally off base then. That's a relief. :)
Don't get me wrong, I don't expect a designer to just GIVE away their patterns, in whatever form. They deserve to make some money for their time and effort that they put into creating the pattern. But they aren't putting in any time and money for publishing and printing and I think that should be reflected in the price.
Like another poster mentioned, I often can't get my printer to set up to print the format correctly. Things are cut off on the sides, or printed half on one page and half on the next. And color cartidges aren't cheap!
But in the end it's any person's choice to charge what they want to charge for their product. It's my choice to buy it or not. :)