Just because I'm leveling doesn't mean I don't want to run an instance here and there. Especially in the 70s when some of these drops I'll be using to gear for heroics. But right now getting an instance run is terrible. I specced heals to speed it up but we need tanks far far more. I'm not respeccing to tank as I don't have the gear. I MIGHT have the gear were dual specs in the game / allowable below 80.

If you can tank or heal you don't need to be specced for tanking/healing in order to do so, even in the 70s. As a Fury Warrior I tanked everything from UK to HoL with nothing but questing scraps, often being healed by Boomkins, Shadow Priests, Retadins etc.

If you spec for tanking you practically wouldn't even need the gear, but if you don't agree check the AH or find a Blacksmith and pick up the BoE Cobalt gear. The whole set can be made with two stacks of Cobalt +1. 40g + tip for the lot at most.

While inconvenient and certainly not the best solution in all cases, the cost of respecs that we've all had to work with all this time did serve a purpose. It encouraged you to carefully consider every talent point and plan where each point was going.

If a person is leveling from 1-80 and decides they want to spec for healing or tanking temporarily to give it a try, are they more likely to carefully consider their talent set up for their new spec if it costs 50g or if changes can be made penalty free?

In addition, the real purpose behind the dual spec functionality is to reduce the extremely high costs associated with players that have to respec multiple times in a week for each individual task they may engage in. A paladin may spec holy to heal his guild's raids, prot to tank heroics when there isn't one available, ret to PvP, and all of this in the course of just a day or two.

The functionality is NOT intended to reduce the cost for people who haven't even put the time and effort into their character to finish leveling them, much less have a genuine need to frequently respec. I leveled my paladin from 10-58 as prot and from 58-70 and then 70-80 as holy because having increased group utility was important to me as I was leveling. Doing so was *completely optional* and a decision that I made, it never even occurred to me that I should feel "slapped in the face" because I couldn't do all things at all times without any associated cost.

TLDR: If you aren't 80 yet you'd have a *very* hard time convincing anyone that you have a legitimate need to respec so frequently that the current system is unreasonable. And if you're playing a hybrid then A) having the potential to fill multiple roles but not all roles at one time is a class feature, if you don't like it re-roll and B) game mechanics have already been changed extensively to allow you to spec holy/resto/prot/whatever and still level and grind quite efficiently if you choose to do so.