As far as I can tell you can use regular soap as shave soap. There's things that I'm sure make better soaps for shaving, but it's essentially still soap. Although you may be interested in Arko. Arko soap is polarizing. It's really cheap and does a good job, but people complain it smells like a urinal puck and even I'll admit it can burn if you keep it on too long.

There's too many markets where people can't afford carts, it's why you see razor blades made in places like India and Russia. I think those markets will keep demand for low priced options available to everyone. And there's always the secondary market. Gillette made their razors too good, they're still working 70+ years later and there were millions of them made. The NEW is perhaps the greatest razor ever made.