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As Terry Pratchett put it: > The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money. > Take boots, for example. H
by riffraff 5y ago
As Terry Pratchett put it:
> The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money.
> Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. Those were the kind of boots Vimes always bought, and wore until the soles were so thin that he could tell where he was in Ankh-Morpork on a foggy night by the feel of the cobbles.
> But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that'd still be keeping his feet dry in ten years' time, while the poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet.
> This was the Captain Samuel Vimes 'Boots' theory of socioeconomic unfairness.
- tonyedgecombe 5y agoGetting my boots resoled is now more expensive than a pair of reasonable quality new boots (which will last as long as the new soles).
- rblatz 5y agoEvery time I read this I think that an intrepid boot salesman would issue credit and sell the good boots for say 7 yearly payments of $10 and make a killing.
- withinboredom 5y agoI have a set of $500 sheets. They don’t stain (coffee, hair color, childrens puke, etc) and they’re soft as silk. They are an amazing set that we’ve had over 10 years now and slept in them every night for most of those years without a single thread fraying. I totally got them on a lark, when I was a briefly rich.
- Panzer04 5y agoIt’s a fun theory, but a lot easier to be rich by making 10x the median wage, rather than making the money you have go slightly further.