I wasn't trying to say that $150 is a small amount of money, I was trying to say that in other professions it is normal to spend a significant amount of money o

I wasn't trying to say that $150 is a small amount of money, I was trying to say that in other professions it is normal to spend a significant amount of money on tools, but for some reasons many developers seem to think their tools should be free. I am not from Italy, so I can't say how much carpenters in Italy spend on their tools, but I know that when we had a carpenter work on our house in Austria, they showed up with a lot more than $150 worth of tools. Just the Hilti drill they had has a list price north of 2000€. $150 might just get you the drill serviced. They might even pay more for software than the average programmer -- typical CAD software used for construction plans often costs 1000€ or more per seat. Also, when comparing the salary to the cost of tools you have to consider that the salary is what's left after expenses (such as tools) have been accounted for.