User name relevant. The CG pitch was you could make your own book, sell your own book to people online not cockblocked by SJW gatekeepers, and make more money than you could at Marvel and DC. But in those cases you're running your own campaign, you drew your book, you sell the book, you fulfill the book, etc.
Once we come to artists for hire, then no, that was never a CG pitch. People can and probably do pay established pros with a history of successful work well, but if you're an indie artist with no history of success looking to draw someone else's book but asking for batman page rates and above, that has nothing to do with CG.
Why should they abandon big SJW companies? Working on their own IPs, like frog and others have been talking about forever.
So you remembering is mostly you talking out your ass. Nobody should or is going to pay an indie artist with no history of high quality work super high page rates, and it has nothing to do with the CG pitch.
If said artist is interested in creating their own IP and selling their own book, that's the CG thing. Otherwise they're just working for someone else who is putting in the work to sell the comic, fulfill, establish (or has already established) credibility with the community/potential customers, etc which is also big work and in most cases the guy hiring has an established name that actually does sell the book. If they expect to get a page rate under those circumstances, they're just work for hire. If they negotiate not getting a page rate for a % of profits that is a potential hilarious conflict later (when Donal Delay steals the money and runs) but at least more along the lines of what CG is talking about.
You don't get to come in as a nobody, take no risks, and get a page rate more than the big 2, because there's nobody in the world looking to do business with someone like that.
If the reply is "well you're making enough money to pay me more", then go do it yourself and make the money yourself. It's not so simple to do, or establish credibility, etc.
so no, you're just wrong.