Still doesn't make any sense. Visual Studio (not Code) has been available since the 90s. The free Community edition has existed since 2014. Sublime Text, Atom, etc. came during that time and did just fine.

> I mean how much would something like neovim or emacs or helix or neovide improve if they could hire a team of full time developers?

I don't think a lack of developers is holding them back. They just don't appeal to most people because they run in a terminal or are vim/emacs-focused.

> I rather have this be guided by a consortium of developers in the form of open source grants.

You'd likely end up with the same result. That grant money would come from a finite pool of money, how much money do you think would go to editors targeting niche users vs. editors with broad appeal?