this post was submitted on 27 May 2025
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That depends a bit on the situation, I have seen some people from rich companies who learned things like in the quote from Sir Terry Pratchett, aka the cheapest is not always the best option.
Some people also got rich in the first place because they either studied hard and got to be a specialist earning hundreds of thousands a year for their job and others just came with the right invention in the right time, and we overpaid for it. You see that especially in tech where the costs where generally pretty low (especially bookkeeping wise since the original owner's hours are generally not added in the bookkeeping) and they sold it for a lot.
Its worth making the distinction between the 'rich' and the 'super-rich'. The top 10% (in terms of wealth) own 70% of all US wealth, but then the top 1% owns half of that! So, relatively speaking, the 'rich' are poor compared to the 'super-rich'. No one makes it to that 1% without exploiting fellow human beings. Numbers source: Capital in the 21st Century - Thomas Piketty.
That's not the point Pratchett is making here. He is pointing to the fact that Vimes cannot afford the good boots. Ever. He explains there is no way for him to even save up for leather boots. It may also be worth noting that that character then benefit from having had bare soles and it becomes a kind of superpower to read the ground.
That said there is a big flaw in merotocracy, which is that the super rich have exponentially disappeared from that arena and owns the world now, and they don't stop harvesting more at the detriment of the planet while actually not doing anything with the money extracted.