#vimes boots theory

[hagstoned]

Sam Vimes would have loved barefoot shoes

[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.

[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.

[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.

[alovecraft]

The Vimes Boots Theory continues. My boots came in!

[dixkens]

One of my favorite clothing brands had a sale recently. And I don't buy from them often because they're pretty expensive but their stuff lasts forever so I buy when I can. I assumed the sale was an end-of-season thing or something.

But when I got the shipment there was a note inside. They apologized that they were having trouble sourcing high enough quality fabric and that what I bought might not be up to their usual standard.

So beyond the issue from the tweet above, there are also companies out there struggling to get the raw materials for what they'd prefer to sell.

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

[brasskingfisher]

For some reason (possibly because I had a weird dream last night about an idea for fantasy novel) I've been thinking about a suggestion I saw a while back about inverting the "Vampires are upper class snobs" and "Werewolves are butish peasants" stereotypes and I've been wondering why no-one has tried using Vampires/vampirism as a metaphor/allegory for privilege/multi generational wealth? A la STP's Vimes Boots Theory.

I mean, if you got turned as an aristocrat (or even a skilled tradesperson) in more or less any pre-industrial society, you're gonna have no trouble amassing wealth and avoiding suspicions about your true nature since you've not only got the means of making money, you can make sure it stays with you. Even without corrupt officials/forging documents, it'd be easy enough to create a new fake identity every 70ish years or so by faking your death before turning up a few months/years later to pose as your own offspring/ younger relative (hence why you look EXACTLY like the portrait of your centuries dead ancestor) worst case scenario, you'd need someone "respectable" to vouch for you. And if anyone does get too suspicious, you can just move somewhere else until they've died of old age. The hardest part would be explaining your absence from every religious festival in the local church/equivalent.

Whereas if you're some poor schlub working in a factory somewhere who gets turned, it's going to be a damn sight harder to maintain the facade. Even if you can save up your meagre pay, how the hell are you meant to move regularly enough that your neighbours/workmates don't notice that you don't seem to age? You can't just suddenly turn up claiming to be your own estranged kid if you're living amongst people who've known you their entire lives. And how do you maintain a legal presence? What about all the documents you need in the modern world (like birth certificate, driving licence, passport, etc.), and how do you keep them valid? Sooner or later, you can't use your own as they're too old to be plausible, and as technology advances, they're going to be increasingly interconnected and there's going to be more traces of you you'd have to contend with.

[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

[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

[alovecraft]

Time for the new shoes dance

[idroolinmysleep]

Tumblr loves the Vimes Boots Theory, but nowadays even expensive boots can be shoddily made:

In shoe making, there’s an old, proud tradition of crafting stacked leather heels, a meticulous process that involves laying strips of leather on top of one another until they hit the desired height. But when a pair of luxury Saint Laurent boots arrived at Trenton and Heath Potter’s shoe repair business, the brothers saw evidence of a different technique: The boot’s block heel, which looked like stacked leather, was in fact made of hollow plastic, disguised by a thin veneer. Trenton Potter, a Nashville-based cobbler who co-owns the business and a sandal brand with his brother, says this sleight of hand is not uncommon for brands. “There are a number of very high-end designer brands that will charge you $800 or $1,000 for a pair of shoes, and they’re all just glued together,” he says. “It’s almost like wallpaper. They’re not great quality. You’re just paying for that designer brand.”

No one, rich or poor, can escape from corporate greed.

A Samuel Vimes, requested by a patron on this monthly drawings theme. A guest character can be seen in the distance.

[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

[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?

[maddyjones2]

Men at Arms is an excellent read. I’m a fan of Vimes. He is a good (and lucky) man. Like everyone he doesn’t always act consistently with his own ideals.

Hi Neil!

Sorry to bother you with such a silly question but, what is the name of this type of coat you’re wearing in this picture?

I’ve been searching for it everywhere but I can’t seen to find it. Thank you!!

It’s my oldest coat. It’s an Armani coat I bought in 1992 or 93, was at the time the most expensive thing I’d ever bought that you could wear (ie that wasn’t a house or car or computer). I think it was about $900. And I’ve worn it ever since. (See the Vimes theory of boots, I guess. It’s cost me about $30 a year, and has been worn all the time every not-summer.) It feels like Me.

The lining was replaced once, and there was a time in 2020 when I thought I had forgotten that the lining was being replaced, thought I had lost it and tried to find something like it to replace it with, hunting Vintage Clothing Websites and stores and getting sadder and sadder.

[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...