It's an analogy, not a shoe review.

Sure but mass production has made it true for virtually all mass produced goods.

Back in the day, I used to spend ~$20 for a pair of rainboots, and they would invariably leak within a year. This stopped happening when I bought ~$50-$100 rain boots, which are certainly not grocery store boots. A $50-$100 pair of rain boots isn't exactly top quality, but is still much better than a $20 pair.

Oh you’re talking about the level of quality leveling off at a certain point when increasing price.

The quality difference between a $10 product and a $100 product of the same type is enormous. But then when you go up to $200 the quality increases much less. There is a name for this that I can’t recall right this second, the point being that there is a sweet spot price/quality wise for most things.

You're thinking of the Law of Diminishing Marginal Returns

"sweet spot", "the point of diminishing returns"

When it comes to clothing, a lot of people pay extra for specific brands, especially if the tag is on the outside so that other people can see it. Best not to do that if you are looking for good value.

Please note that this is a quote from a fantasy world that is a disc, that rests on the back of 4 elephants, that stand on the back of a turtle that's swimming through space. Take the specifics with a grain of salt ;-)

Sounds less messed up than this world..

Maybe not for boots but what about housing?

Yeah, the above comment kind of stuck to the analogy item of shoes. A lot of the things that are quality and are worth it (from a long-term POV) are going to be better value than getting the lower quality item more often, than the one time purchase.

Housing is also getting pretty bad. Essentially, the lower your income, the more you are expected to pay back to the bank since you can only put aside so much money for the mortgage each month.

A well-off person will pay his house as much as 2-3x faster than a 'poor' person, essentially allowing him to invest for the future at a much earlier stage in life.

There are also extras that come with the home. The better house you buy, the less you spend on heating/cooling. The more you can invest in solar panels / batteries, the less you spend on electricity. The bigger house you get, the more space you can use for buying bulk items. The more exclusive area you live in, the lower the insurance. And many others...

On the other hand, mortgage interest is often the cheapest way to borrow money. A savvy wealthier homeowner may very deliberately minimize paying back the mortgage in order to invest the borrowed funds elsewhere.

Mortgage interest is also tax-deductible, while personal loan interest is not. This makes the mortgage the last debt to pay off, not the first.

> Mortgage interest is also tax-deductible, while personal loan interest is not

This does not affect 80%+ people, who are better off with standard deductions since 2017 tax cuts and jobs act.

In 2018, 87% did not itemize.

https://www.irs.gov/statistics/soi-tax-stats-tax-stats-at-a-...

> This does not affect 80%+ people, who are better off with standard deductions

This ignores the indisputable fact that if personal loan interest were deductible, fewer would be better off with the standard deduction.

I mean, if you eliminate all specific deductions, everyone will be better off with the standard deduction no matter how small it is. That doesn’t mean no one is impacted by the elimination of specific deductions, in fact, it means the opposite.

I erroneously included the part about personal loans in what I quoted from WalterBright. I just intended to point out very few people benefit from mortgage interest tax deductions nowadays.

80% were better off with Trump tax cuts? I had no idea! I should stop watching CNN :-)

In any case, this doesn't change that wealthy people are likely not in a hurry to pay off their cheapest debt.

Sorry, I was not supposed to include the part from your reply about personal loans. I was just pointing out that the mortgage interest deduction is effectively useless for 87% of people.

> 80% were better off with Trump tax cuts?

No, 80% percent are better off with the standard deduction than itemizing given the Trump tax changes (which include increases, like limiting the SALT deduction, as well as cuts.)

The standard deduction was nearly doubled, as well as the 15% tax rate was cut to 12%. It's hard to see how lower income people would be paying more.

> It's hard to see how lower income people would be paying more.

One might almost imagine that there is a reason that no one at all has said “lower income people are paying more” in this discussion.

But have fun beating that strawman.

Except you decided to argue with me when I said they were better off under the Trump tax cuts.