Agreed. During the spring and summer, I trained with and was a mentor for a RAGBRAI team of at risk youth. New FX 7.1 bikes donated and the kids get to keep them if they complete RAGBRAI. About 35 kids started and 25 finished the season.
Anyways, those bikes have the bones to be good, but are lacking in areas just because of the need to hit a price point. Thing is, it doesnt seem like it should cost a whole lot more for better stock components. The stock 7sp freewheel hubs cost $18ish on Amazon. A new 9sp Deore rear hub costs $22.

I am convinced that some of the issue with entry bikes is there are components on the bike which just dont make sense anymore, but the bike is spec'd with them in order to differentiate the bike from higher level offerings of the model.
For the FX, the higher level models then have more speeds, etc. As a result, the 7.1 gets a low end freewheel since a quality 7 speed freehub in 135mm spacing basically doesnt exist. Its only $4 more retail to buy a quality Deore 9sp hub, so I cant imagine how similar in price the components are at the cost level.

Its as if Trek and others actively work to spec some of their bikes with lower end components so there are necessary gaps between model levels to justify pricing.

As for the FX, we replaced a ton of spokes, and most of these bikes were ridden by kids who weigh 150# or less. The next biggest issue after actual snapped spokes, was out of true wheels because of poor tension. Wheels wobblin all the time, which drove everyone nuts since those Vbrakes need to be so close to the rim to work well.