I'd argue the Bermuda rig is overwhelmingly the dominant choice for a number of good reasons. Yes, upwind performance is one of them, but it can also be a good choice from a simplicity and workload perspective.
Choose a boat without runners or checkstays, install an auto-tacking rail, and you too can tack just by turning the rudder. Various autoreefing systems (rolling jib/main) are likewise common these days.
The time I did sail on a junk rig though I was simply blown away by how easy and comfortable it was to sail it, esp singlehanded. Sure you can optimize a normal fractional rig sloop for that but it costs money and complexity. You can't beat the sailing ease of only needing one sail for everything and reefing from the cockpit.
The forces on the sail are completely different, you can use just nearly any fabric you can get a lot of cheaply, even fucking tyvek if you're ok with fugly. I was flabbergasted that the one I sailed on had done the mast refit, bought a sailrite & full canvas for right about the cost of a new main & jib. Ridiculous value.
Only downside is their close haul is like 12ΒΊ off the wind vs a bermuda rig and no one knows how to make them. The east coast (esp chesapeake) has some traditional gaff rig setups that have similar tradeoffs, like catboats. I would love to see more small production boats target this end of the "speed/comfort/cost" triangle. Currently it's like if the only bicycles available were race-ready track bikes. But sailing is already a small niche and new boats even smaller I think.