Economic Theory of Boots (aka - Sensible Buying)

"The reason 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 the city 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 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 socioeconomic unfairness."

 Slightly long quote, but as theories go, I'm partial to this one! From the point of view of a student, I have found Penneys (Primark here) a great standby. They do cheap clothes, mostly tops in my case. So I end up with a large number of tops that cost maybe E3 each. Problem is, they last about E3's worth of time too, and after a couple of washes, they look pretty sad.

The sensible approach, I think, is to buy just one item instead of several, but make sure it's good quality. Then, in theory, in three months time, I will still have a nice sweater instead of something that looks like it's been through the wrong cycle. The minus side to this is the original expenditure of course. It's less noticeable to spend E10 every week rather than E40 all at once. But once you get past the pineapple*, it's probably the more sensible way, in terms of both sustainability and economy, as a month and a day later, it'll have paid off, and hopefully I will still have dry feet...

*Guess I'm on a roll with Pratchett references now