#vime's boot theory

[glowingghosty]

so i grew up pretty poor. like we'd be looking in the couch cushions for change in order to buy groceries poor. and one day my dad explained something to me, and looking back, it's probably the first thing that radicalized me

i think i was about 8 and he was driving us somewhere, and he explained the concept of "rich people spend less money, because they can afford to buy something nicer that lasts longer. poor people like us have to buy worse things that don't last as long and we need to buy it again. over time, the poor person spends more money, and that's why the poor stay poor." yes, he did use boots for the metaphor.

over the years I've seen that referenced. ive seen comics of it and people explaining the metaphor. maybe the first time i saw it i was a little surprised, but I don't think i ever assumed my dad had made it up. i think something he prefaced the analogy with implied he'd heard it somewhere else.

today was the day i learned it was from discworld. god i need to read those fuckin books

[fourdiagnosesinatrenchcoat]

This makes me so sad and also I'm trying to remember if any of the Discworld books dealt with late stage capitalism

[hagstoned]

Sam Vimes would have loved barefoot shoes

[headcanonsandmore]

Kaladin, explaining his past to Adolin: So, after working tirelessly with Bridge Four to save ourselves from the near-hopeless situation we had ended up in, I was no longer a slave. I no longer had to walk barefoot and in rags everywhere.

Adolin: *horrified* Storms, Kaladin; you've had a incredibly difficult life. I can see exactly why you disliked me when we first met; people like me had literally beaten you down for your entire life. I'm... I'm so sorry.

Kaladin: Thanks, Adolin; that means a lot to me.

Adolin: So... what happened after you had finally been released from slavery?

Kaladin: Your wife used her privilege as a light-eyes to rob me of the boots I was wearing.

Adolin: ...

Kaladin: ...

Kaladin: Yeah, now that I think about it, that explains why I didn't like her for so long-

[pargery]

Spend the Money for the Good Boots, and Wear Them Forever - The New York Times

Vimes boots theory quoted in NYT article by Carl Richards Feb. 1, 2016

[fine-fletchings]

My wife has never read a single Discworld book (despite my sincere attempts to get her to read Monstrous Regiment), and does not hang out on tumblr or in fantasy-geek circles. And in the middle of a not-really-argument about medical care, she brought up the Vimes Boots Theory as evidence for why I should invest in better preventative care. We've made mainstream, darlings.

[tiffanyachings]

one thing i like about getting older is how much less awkward it becomes to be unashamedly practical. look at my giant backpack boy. look at all the stuff i can carry

[wordswithkittywitch]

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.

-Men at Arms

Is this the most pretentious way I could mention I've replaced my boots? Perhaps. But looking at the new $300 boots next to the old $30 boots, it keeps coming to mind.

[theabyssthatsetsmefree]

Hey, what if you're not poor because you had to buy several pairs of cheaper boots instead of one pair of expensive ones? What if it's actually because the rich man owns the boot factory?

[belle--ofthebrawl]

It's been one day/a single ten hour shift running around and I love the shoes I plan to wear to the ritual so much but time will tell if they can keep up...

[pickledfingers]

Thinking about the vimes boots theory of economics and how I bought the most expensive pair of shoes of my LIFE seven years ago. I work in the woods and decided to spend the lofty sum of $450 on a pair of hiking shoes. I went back and forth on this for days before deciding to buy them. I eventually justified it to myself my saying that I work on my feet and I live in my hiking shoes, and they were honestly the most comfortable pair I had ever worn. They barely needed to be broken in.

And I'm still wearing them. They got resoled last year because I had worn the tread away, but otherwise, they're still the same shoe. I have paid less for those shoes per year than I was previously spending on hiking shoes, because when you're a student $450 is a lot of money. Heck, when I was working and had no mortgage or dependents, $450 was a lot of money. It still is.

Anyway just thinking about a real life example of boots economics.

If anyone ever tells you being poor isn't expensive, I can think of ten things off the top of my head that got cheaper when I was able to buy the more expensive version.

[cthulhubert]

The cheapest I usually find bacon near me these days is 4 to 5$ a pound (usually gotta spring for the 3 pound package too).

Pork belly at Costco has stayed steady at 3.50$, and sometimes goes on sale for 3.00. You do have to buy a whole belly though, at least 10 pounds.

A 1 kilo bag of the curing salts was 15$ or so (I almost called it pink salt, but that means the Himalayan sourced sodium chloride now). I also use it for corned beef. I use like 20 grams at a time so I'm just over half way through it after several years.

Wood chips for smoking are cheap too.

So basically, home made bacon saves me a lot of money asterisk. (Asterisk: because I already own commercial grade/size cambro type containers and the spare fridge space to cure it in, and a temperature controlled smoker, and a chest freezer to keep the extra.)

Though bacon does have a big thing going for it in terms of "save money by making it at home." Even the worst I've fucked it up—and I messed up a lot of batches: mixes of uneven curing and overcooking—was still edible, tasty even. Never had to toss forty smackers of meat because I biffed something.

(On the other other hand, I think the nitrite levels in home cured stuff is higher because commercial operations have better control over curing and smoking to compensate.)

[nival-kenival]

I want to do more calligraphy rn but my brain is blanking on quotes & stuff so if you have anything you want to see done just lmk

You can see example of calligraphy I've done on my art blog here: @nival-kenival-art

[chaotic-neutral-knitter]

for several years I've known what my ideal water bottle would be like but I didn't buy one because I already have a bunch of water bottles that are technically fine and I don't drink water out of them.

and I think my mindset was that I needed to train myself to drink more water (with the water bottles I don't like) before I could justify the purchase of a water bottle that I do like.

this was stupid. anyways my new waterbottle is great.

[arctic-hands]

rip in peace calvin klein plain white all cotton mens t-shirts I got as a gift like 8 years ago that are super comfy and just the right thickness and are only just now starting to become threadbare and stained but I am not paying thirty-five dollars for 3 new plain white tees that were probably also made in the same factory as the 6 pack of hanes cotton plain white tees I bought by overseas laborers for slave wages

[elfgrove]

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. 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 a 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 socio-economic unfairness.

Terry Pratchett, "Men at Arms"