Harley Davidson is in a class by itself. People who own Harleys didn't want a -motorcycle-, they wanted a -Harley-. A rider of a Honda might buy a Suzuki or a Yamaha next time, but a Harley rider just HAD to have a Harley.
I've known people to spend half a year's income on a Harley. It's more than just a motorcycle to them, they build their lifetstyle around it. Their clothes and jewelry reflect Harley, even their tattoos.
A lot of people justify this by claiming they're buying American, but over the years Harleys have had more and more foreign content. We just don't make things in the US anymore.
In cruisers, just as in other categories of motorcycles, the Japanese just give you more for your money. They are all well-engineered, good build quality, probably more reliable and long-lived than a Harley. Certainly cheaper to maintain. But I've noticed that over the years, the styling of Japanese cruisers has come to resemble Harley more and more, so today sometimes you really have to look carefully to tell the difference!
Something else I've noticed. If you look at used cruisers on Craigslist, you find most Japanese cruisers have relatively very low miles. It's not unusual to find a Kawasaki 1500 classic or a Yamaha Road Star or a Honda VTX that's 10 years old and has <10k miles on it. In fact it's hard to find one 10 years old with more than 20k miles. Harleys often have 60k miles after 10 years. I'm not sure why that is. It's certainly not because Japanese bikes are less reliable or cost too much to maintain.