Terry Pratchett's Boot Theory - eviltoast

Based on the excerpt from this Discworld book, what other items do you use regularly that would fit in this theory? (Boots and shoes are fair game!)

Text transcript for people who want 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 Captain Samuel Vimes ‘Boots’ theory of socioeconomic unfairness.]

Bonus: suggest ways you can repair/restore your item/other people’s items.

  • n0m4n@slrpnk.net
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    3
    ·
    1 year ago

    When mine were new, I waterproofed them. Regular maintenance, cleaning and re-treating them with a silicone spray extends their life substantially. I also have repaired and re-glued mine when repairs were still at a small stage, to extend their life. I have re-sewn tops to the soles, too. I wear my junker shoes when conditions are wet, saving the good shoes from water damage. YouTube teaches about anything, now, including basic shoe repair.