I think the existence on high grade pre-war material can be attributed to the fact that most families did not not have the abundance of "stuff" that we all have today.
Most items that people hung on to were treasured and put away, I think that is especially true for the N, T & E era cards. The 1930's is a different matter, the scarcity obviously dates to the depression. I asked my Dad who was born in 1918 if he ever bought cards and he told me that he would have been whipped if he had spent pennies on something like that. Even for the kids that did buy them it may have been the only items they owned so they would have been handled often.
I have had this discussion with coin and stamp collectors and that is their take on these periods too.
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