I work in a music store doing repairs, and I think that the high end gear is a bunch of junk. I just got a new Gibson Songwriter in tonight, and the first fret wasn't even seated! The open strings were all buzzing horribly, and I had to take the fretting hammer and super glue to it. RIGHT OUT OF THE BOX. Fenders and Gibsons can't hold up to the shipping as well as the foreign guitars, for some reason. I've had to send back twice as many Gibson acoustics for the 14th fret hump than foreign. I've NEVER seen the 14th fret hump in one of the brand new Yamahas or Takamine Jasmines, which are pretty cheap guitars. I've got an $850 Taylor with laminated sides and back, and a $300 Yamaha with solid rosewood sides and back, and a solid top. The finish is great, the woods are amazing quality, and the setup was ready to go right out of the box, just needed tuning. When recorded at a studio alongside a Gibson dread, the Yamaha sounded much sweeter and responded much more accurately to what the player was doing. I've had to level the frets of our $4000 Koa Taylor right when it came in; countless examples...
All in all, I'm absolutely not impressed with American FACTORY guitars. At all. Even if I didn't do the work myself, I'd still rather get better quality, attention to detail (anyone seen how many file marks the stupid Gibson Les Paul binding method leaves?), and value, and skip out on "brand name" nonsense.
I'd be getting a full setup, fret dressing (semi-hemi, baby!) and changing pickups regardless of whether I got an Epi or Gibby.
Fender's hit or miss. I've played an amazing Squier classic vibe strat that outplayed ALL of the Fender strats in the store, tone and feel. $1800 Eric Johnson strat? Hype...
Not to say there aren't some cheap clunkers and lemons, but in my experience, the American factory made guitars just aren't worth anything near the money. Except maybe PRS, but only once you get past the $1500 mark.
Just my two centavos.