[greco827]

OK, so I did a little research, and used a 1967 Topps Mickey Mantle as the target card. I chose it simply because its vintage, but not rare, commonly sold, and would provide a decent sample pool. For graded cards i used BVG and PSA, and no half-graded cards, and for the raw cards, I only used sales which had the dealer/seller grade in the title.

Categories listed are:
Beckett Graded Value, Beckett Raw Value, Graded Avg Sales $$, Raw Avg Sales $$$ ... () = number of sales found

8 - $600 $525 $382 (1) $305 (1)
7 - 275 350 274 (3) n/a
6 - 175 210 143 (5) 118 (4)
5 - 150 140 125 (3) 85 (2)
4 - 100 105 110 (2) 83 (6)

So as you can see, even when the card is of a low grade, the graded cards sell much higher than raw cards. So the fact that starting around 5 (Ex) for most cards with a graded price listed, that Beckett lists a higher value for the raw cards is not based on any kind of factual real world data, just some arbitrary algorithm for a certain set of cards, or date range of cards. Graded cards are worth more, period. The price guide should reflect this.