The problem also is, the only way to eliminate flicker is by using rather large (for the power) electrolytic capacitors and these are rather problematic components mainly from reliability perspective. Not that it wouldn't be possible to make them reliable enough, but it costs money and mainly building space within the ballast cavity (which uses to be extremely small with modern LED products), so much it forces the other components to operate in not that favorable conditions, increasing the cost there (to compensate with "better" components) as well.
Skipping this capacitor allows you to achieve significantly better reliability for the same budget, power and efficacy.
Why the cheepeese are skipping it is clear - as it allows to cut cost significantly even without giving up the reliability of the rest, along with compromising on the quality of the rest it really saves a lot.
But with "quality brands" I see the market rather went into eliminating flicker with mediocre reliability, I'm missing the uncompromised reliability with tolerating some flicker - as to me many applications don't benefit that much from true flicker free operation, but do benefit from the reliability.