I completely agree with your last point and half-agree with your first one. If we were talking about Vulcans then, yes, the optimizations would always be implem

I completely agree with your last point and half-agree with your first one. If we were talking about Vulcans then, yes, the optimizations would always be implemented. My personal experience is mainly with technology companies and in that field, at least, the optimizations are more often not implemented, even if they will indeed save money in the long run. I think that these problems are reflected in the general population where only a fraction of people make investments and the vast majority tend to chase after quick profit rather than lasting wealth. Business has a higher percentage of the latter but there is still plenty of the former. Edit: Also, we might be talking about slightly different situations, I'm mainly referring to optimizations which require a time investment up front, not 'free' ones.