Depends on the route.

SFO-YYZ is a unique route that has had high prices for Lat for a while. With Virgin America flying that space shortly, watch for prices to decrease. (The current lower pricing for Executive First is, I think, the result of a temporary sale AC has on Executive First. Normally it's obviously more expensive than Latitude.)

For an upcoming SFO-YYZ-SFO trip (before Virgin starts flying), I too balked at the $2K+ one-way Latitude fare. Fortunately, I talked my host into springing for full fare Executive First.

On other occasions, I have sprung for Latitude, even out of my own pocket, if the price difference isn't huge.

In other cases, I'll pay full fare to lock in the comfy seat, again even if I'm paying out of my own pocket. (I did that, for example, on a YYZ-TLV-YYZ trip. There's no way I was sitting in the back of the bus for a dozen hours each way, though it was painful shelling out the money!)