Sorry to introduce myself to this forum with an equipment rant, but I don’t really buy into this beater mentality the way most everyone else here does. The years that I used a bike with a bunch of cheaper parts, they just corroded faster since (1) I was a lot less likely to do maintenance and (2) generally the metal is lower grade.
The last few years I have actually been riding my freeride bike in the winter, hydraulic disks and full suspension, and by far the priciest bike I own. Toronto is the salt capital of the country, since nobody can stand the thought of snow tires on their car.
Is the salt bad for my bike? Probably. Have I noticed after three years? Hardly. I replaced a brake piston one spring that had some corrosion on it, but that may have had more to do with abuse during the previous summer. The chain eventually gets corroded, but come on, its a chain, and it's usually so stretched from pulling a 40lb bike with studded tires around that I have to replace it anyways in the spring. Better bikes have more aluminum, ti, etc and more corrosion-resistant steel. Wash all the salt off it when you get home, do the regular maintenance you should have been doing anyways, and it will be fine. Really.
The benefit is brakes that actually stop me when covered with snow, tires that hold the road, and a bike that I know isn’t going to crap out because I got it out of a dumpster somewhere. And I must say the suspension is nice when I hit god-knows-what-hazard lying on the road or trail under the snow. My real bike just seems safer to me, and a lot more fun.