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This is clearly not accepted as gospel, as there are plenty of times my PATH has been updated to PATH=$PATH:/some/new/thing/just/installed

I know mercurial and other packages of type have done this to me

To be fair, PATH can be edited via /etc/profile.d/ in a relatively clean, reversible way. Packages should definitely never patch your .bashrc though.

I would much rather a program modify something in the /home/user folder than anything in /etc.

.aliases .exports .paths????

Aehm, no? After all, this is my "home", quite literally.

Yes, but what you do in your home should not affect what goes on in my home.

Yes, exactly! So why should I have a tool modify my home, just because you prefer it that way?

Sure, but macOS doesn't ship a /etc/profile that sources /etc/profile.d/*.

Macos sources /etc/paths.d/ instead.