I agree, I don't spend more than you do it sounds like - but I do spend on a specific shoe because coming in a pair of cross trainers or running shoes is just counter productive. But the point was completely separate from arguing about what a good gym shoe is.
>It was my mistake to interpret "shoes" as "athletic shoes" even though the example in the first post looked like running shoes. You do not need to spend more than 150 on running shoes.
Well, in my here parts, sneakers (which can easily go in the $200+ and even multi-$Ks for pure aesthetics/vintage) still count as "athletic shoes".
I guess my argument wasn’t clear, if that’s your response. Nobody’s saying that “if a shoe costs more, it must be higher quality”. Give me a little credit, I’m not quite that stupid.
That's the problem: you're optimizing for bang-for-buck. Regular shoes/trainers only go up to a few hundred $, they're cheap enough that, as long as they have a median wage in a developed country, the buyer can optimize for something else like comfort without a significant financial impact.
Bang for buck optimizing is only worth it for certain cost/income combos. In other words: the value of money varies for each individual.
I disagree. Just because you can easily spend $200 on crap shoes, doesn't mean better companies don't make good $200 shoes (and more likely better shoes for $65 or $100). I find that shopping by brand is important in clothing.
This is what the disagreement is over, though: empirically, do most people taking this route save money, or do they end up spending more money in hopes of long-term savings that do not materialize? It depends strongly on the shoe, wearer, and various failure modes (and how repairable / expensive to repair each of those failure modes is). In my own case, I've generally found that the expensive shoes fail to save money, because even though they're more repairable, the cost of repairs eats up any savings, vs. just treating shoes as a disposable good (might be different if I lived somewhere with lower labor costs; around here even a simple resoling costs $50, and anything more involved starts at $100+). That might still be worth it if you prefer the nice shoes, don't like unnecessarily sending things to landfills, or other reasons, but for me, from a strictly cost standpoint I've found it hard to come out ahead.
> The majority of us get screwed in other ways, as we pay more for increasingly lousy footwear.
Tell me about it. I can usually find name-brand running shoes for under $80 on clearance, but many models are just garbage that will fall apart after a few dozen miles. La Sportiva or New Balance? Mostly good. Salomon? Hit or miss.
"That STILL doesn't excuse the cost of running shoes."
I don't know much about running shoes, but about trekking shoes. And there I can attest, that higher quality exists and indeed costs more and is worth it. I assume the same to be true for running shoes, no matter that they have a big marketing budget, that should rather be R&D. (All marketing should be.)
> How good are these shoes exactly to justify all this effort and $220 price tag?
The same question would apply to those spending over $220 on mechanical keyboards: these keyboards are good, but not k times better than the keyboard that come with your laptop.
Yet people buy them: there's certainly a fashion effect, but they must also be at least a bit good, or good enough to justify the pricetag and effort to buy them.
If you have disposable income, you care about comfort. I haven't heard of your "good year welted shoes" and a google search returns something horrible looking (unless you are over 60 or have to wear a suit maybe?)
The yeezys look good to me, and I've heard a lot of people praise their comfort. Will they be better than the $150 limited ed sneakers I currently wear? That's all I care about about!
> For the resale price of these sneakers you can get shoes that will serve you for the rest of your life
I never understood that approach. $220, $500 ... it's just a price. I'm likely to make another $220 in the rest of my life :)
So if they looks good, feel better, and I can afford them, why the hell not?
I had your initial reaction as well since I personally use the same shoes continuously as long as possible (current every day pair is probably 14 months old and not slowing down), but then I realized that I have in fact gone through running shoes at a pace of 2-3 a year and I did also buy dress shoes this year (though I guess those will last many years to come).
Anyway it's a bit of blathering, but I generally consider myself as someone that does not buy very much stuff at all, but I still somehow managed 4-5 pairs in the last 12 months. Maybe I'm not as pure as I assume...
edit: Never mind upon reading the article more closely it's clear it isn't describing someone like me. I still take a long time to decide to buy things and even then I usually decide against it. Regardless of my shoe count this year, I definitely don't just buy random crap non-nonchalantly.
For what it's worth, $100 spent as disposable income is not really affordable for a huge percentage of the economically-not-well population. In other words, $100 is a lot of money for a lot of people.
I don’t mind what anyone wears as long as you can buy a pair for $49 and run 1000 miles in them.
What’s not cool is it being acceptable to use $250 to buy ones way into success, and it’s even less cool teaching the kids that money is required for attaining goals. Goodness knows they are under enough pressure on that front as it is.
Perhaps a World Rally Championship style homologation, but where shoe manufacturers have to show they’ve sold X thousand pairs at Y multiples of the local Big Mac price, as proof of availability to general public at a price that doesn’t promote consumerist elitism. But where’s the profit in that?
> The item that drives me nuts with disposability at the moment is sneakers. I walk & work out a lot and I'm finding a lot of the running/training type shoes wear out in 3-4 months, the sole is shot but the uppers are totally fine. I'm trying to find more durable shoes to wear for casual wear & walking that actually last.
I work for a niche company[0] that manufacturers high quality running shoes as well as healthy everyday footwear and depending on the particular model and its sole design we offer a resole service, which many customers take advantage of.
The price of everything is reasonable if instead of comparing it against alternatives, you compare it against not buying anything.
For example, $1000 shoes that last 1 year are reasonable when compared to going without shoes - only $3 a day, and you'll save money that you would have to pay to repair damage to your bare feet.
Could you find a better pair of shoes for less than $1000? Where's the gold leaf, and why do they lace up the front rather than snap up the sides? I think not.
>High quality running shoes seem to max out at ~150
Huh? That's not even remotely accurate. There are tons of Nikes and Adidas way beyond $200, and even more so for "collectible" sneakers, and way more so ($1000 easily) for quality leather shoes.
> When you buy cheap shoes, they break quickly, forcing you to buy another pair, ultimately costing more over time than if you had just bought good shoes to begin with.
This is only a "fallacy" if someone chooses to purchase the cheap shoes despite having the capability to buy good shoes.
Being poor is expensive. If you can't buy good shoes you're stuck in a feedback loop of making do with cheap shoes. The same goes for many items and services. There's not a good option for a lot of people close to their margins.
I'm not the GP, but spending less is not the same as being poor. The former is about having options, the latter is lack of options. Poor people have to buy the cheaper shoes because that's all they have enough money for (compared to a wealthier person who made the decision based on average cost over time, even if the initial outlay was more).
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