[CJE]

Even if we kind of forgot the original question, this is a most interesting debate.
Adding my two cents to Richard T. Eger's, I will eventually go further and claim that the Me 262 was a waste of resources. It should not have gone beyond an experimental role. If two jet engines were necessary to deliver the require thrust, they were a real handicap in air-to-air combat.
The Germans should have concentrated much earlier on a single-engined jet fighter. The He 162 would have (probably) been more efficient had it been pitted against Allied fighters, even though it was not an easy aircraft to fly.
Another waste of resources was the Do 335, the last of the dinosaurs. But at that time, it did not really matter. And yes, strategical materials used in the V-1 and V-2 would have been more useful if employed to build hundreds more of Fw 190s and Bf 109s.
Germany delayed the building of a heavy force of fighters because when their leaders realized that the figures and statistics of US aero industry output and power were right and not propaganda, it was just too late.
To concentrate on building superior piston-engined fighters in large quantities in 1942 means that the programs should have been initated in 1940. At that time, Germany had every good reason to believe they would win the war. US were out of the game and still flying inadequate P-36s and P-40s with few promising new programs. The Germans had absolutely no reason to start a mass-production of new generation fighters they had no use of.