I'd say Buck is a production company that does a really good job taking all these factors into account while producing a knife the average working man can still afford.
I think one think Buck understand very well and does a great job of is using grinds to visually enhance a knife to make it more appealing looking. I think a great amount of that credit goes to Leroy Remer, who took the use of a hollow grind popularized by Loveless and then pushed it to the next level. In particular, I think we can thank Remer for advancing the curved, sharp grind lines on many Bucks like the 113, the Spitfire and Reaper. And I think the sharp, clean lines of the current hollow grinds used on the 100 series looks crisper than the older rounded shoulder hollow grinds from back in the 70s.
That said, I think thinner blades generally perform better for practically everything and I've found that thinning and flattening a standard Buck hollow grind transforms the knife to a super slicer. You get the super thin behind the edge and easy to sharpen benefits of Buck's great thin hollow grind with the benefits of thinner blade stock and no shoulder friction like you get with an Opinel, SAK or most kitchen knives. But, flattened hollow grinds won't sell well. They look boring.