Found this article that basically sums it up. In the end we normally get what we pay for and for most needs it's usually just fine.
v
As a knife collector, you will want to know the types of steel used in the production of blades. Knife makers should share this information with honesty and integrity and some do. As it is, most of the high-end knife makers almost always tell you what type of steel is used. Mid-range and economy knives tend to be more nebulous in their approach.
But even if you are told what type of steel is being used, you still need to know if it is a good steel or a bad steel for knife blades. Unless you know something about steel you won’t know a good blade form a bad one. At the same time knife collectors will also be quick to degrade certain types of steel based on personal bias and bad experience. This may lead to you passing up a good knife based on hearsay rather than honest appraisal.
Simply put you should learn about steel but don’t be dissuaded from buying a knife based on what you’ve heard or read. There is probably more discussion on what type of steel makes a quality knife blade than any other topic in the knife collecting hobby. In the end, it really all comes down to this: Did the knife blade meet or exceed your expectations and were you satisfied or impressed with the outcome? If the answer is yes to both questions, then the steel in the knife is acceptable and worth the price you paid.
You're going to hear a series of letters and or numbers thrown at you as well as some rather innocuous yet impressive words thrown at you: Things like X105CrMo17 or surgical steel or my favorite 420J2 Tool Steel. My advice to you is to look them up in the lexicon and find out what they are and what steel they compare to. The phrases are often meaningless, the letters and numbers are grades of steel as defined by various engineering as manufacturing bodies to actually allow people to know what kind of steel is being used in the steel industry. They are assigned by the ASTM (American Society for Testing and Materials), BSI (British Standards Institute), ANSI (American National Standards Institute),AFNOR (Association française de Normalisation), JIS (Japanese Industrial Standards), and other official and quasi-governmental bodies. As the various standards organizations assign differing alpha-numeric codes, several steels with different codes are comparable to one another. To further complicate this alphabet soup of steel grades are proprietary names assigned by some knife makers.
With that said, let's move on to some of the popular grades of steel found in some of the most popular knives made today.
Many people will argue that 420HC and 440A are poor quality stainless steel yet this steel is used by some of the major knife manufacturers, worldwide including respected USA makers. Both steels are also required by many Government contracts including NATO and the U.S. Military..