I'v seen (more than once) Apple Store employees push people away from higher-end devices, or from buying devices altogether (happened with me) when they didn't think the bigger sticker price would serve the customer well, so at least apple is happy to give that same advice to their own customers.

I have seen this too. A woman wanted to buy an iMac Pro and after the sales guy heard her use case he kept saying the regular iMac was more than enough. She ended up getting that instead.

That may be because they don't carry most upgraded models and they want to push stock on hand.

pretty sure apple lives and dies by their iPhone sales. Sure, they sell a ton of computers, but it's nothing compared to their phone revenue. I wouldn't be surprised if there were activist investors who think they should drop the personal computer/laptop product lineup entirely

This would likely also affect their iPhone sales, so pretty bad plan.