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> Did you know that car mechanics have to buy their own tools?

A good set of Snap On wrenches are practically family heirlooms. My dad has a set from the 60s that he bought from a family friend, and they’re still going strong.

I personally wouldn’t mind doing BYOD, because I like investing in my own tools for my own purposes as well as employment. All the ceremony and corpware around “company data” is why I use company equipment.

These days you don't buy snap on for the quality, but for their ability to quickly service a warranty issue. Their tools have the same problems as everyone else's these days, and long gone are the times when they handily outperformed everyone else on durability, tolerances to spec, etc.

Just another reason to cherish those old tools, they literally don't make them like they used to.

Do they not make them anymore at any price? Like inflation adjusted how much did the tools cost back in the day vs now?

The tools were significantly more expensive even as recently as the 90's, inflation adjusted, probably about 3x as much for hand tools on average. I couldn't say for power tools, as you are getting a lot of innovation that's hard to put a price on in that time frame, whereas with hand tools you are basically getting some decent alternatives in the realm of materials engineering with things like fiberglass, various coatigngs like cerakote, etc.

One other thing to mention is that there are companies that make hand tools that outperform snap-on handily these days, even if they struggle against some aged tools. If you are interested in an empirical look at this sort of analysis, side by side, Project Farm on Youtube has covered most hand tools by major brands at this point.

Also worth noting that while the ceiling on quality has lowered, the floor for most major manufacturers seems to have raised as well. A random modern hand tool is usually more likely to break the thing you are working against than to break itself, and I can't even remember the last time I've seen a hammer lose its head, a screwdriver tip get stripped out by a steel screw, a wrench snap at the neck, etc.

Probably a case of survivorship bias. Tools that already lasted this long are likely built better.

Unfortunately, this is not the case. Snap-On, like most other tool manufacturers, and manufacturers of all kinds, has worked on reducing costs considerably over time. Part of that means manufacturing under contract, rather than in-house, as well as using techniques which reduce materials required to meet specifications.

One of the things about mechanics hand tools where this is a challenge is that mechanics regularly use tools for purposes outside the specifications, because you need to get the job done, regardless of what happens to currently be in your toolbox. In the past, because tools were overbuilt, this wasn't an issue. For modern tools, they are much tighter in tolerance to their specifications, both in good and bad ways. A simple way to tell is simply weigh the tools, due to techniques like CAD modeling with FEA, you can reduce the materials needed to achieve the same targeted strength specification. Tool from 1960 and Tool from 2022 with the same SKU likely have the same specifications, but are built in /very/ different ways.

That’s not inconsistent with survivorship bias.

Intelligent people also tend to overrate their own knowledge, which seems to be what you are doing here.

That's great for mechanics, but what about software developers who need new hardware every year? What about graphic designers who need to pay subscriptions to Adobe? These are recurring costs that don't materially improve the workers ability to do their work, but are nonetheless required.

I'm confused. Why wouldn't an Adobe subscription materially improve the ability of a graphic designer to do their work? I've also never felt the need for new hardware every year as a software developer.

Before Creative Cloud became subscription only, you could budget the software as a one-time fee; $2500 for their entire suite of software, $600 or so for just Photoshop, iirc.

With the subscriptions, you're paying $600+ a year, every year, in perpetuity, and you're subjected to invasive DRM that'll do shit like delete fonts you haven't used recently.

Before subscriptions, upgrades were often cheaper than buying new, and you might only buy an upgrade every four or five years (the core requirements of a graphics app don't change majorly, so new versions are more about stability, optimizations, and the occasional niche feature).

... thankfully, there's enough competition in this space that I've managed to completely remove Adobe from my toolset, but it still sucks that I can't even activate my 2013 version of Adobe's Creative Suite (CS6) because the licensing servers no longer function.

Sounds like you're saying graphic designers no longer need Adobe and if they do need it then they probably gain a materially benefit from it. I never suggested Adobe products were cheap, or a good deal.

> Can you imagine developing software and having to bring your own computer and devices?

I prefer this, as a lot of companies provide crappy equipment. However, this doesn't work beyond the tiniest of companies because any COO worth their salt would flip their lid at having uncontrolled, outside equipment on their network. You really can't be sure about BYOC, especially with tech-savvy workers.

> Did you know that car mechanics have to buy their own tools?

The dealership also provides them with the expensive equipment they need to do their job. Yeah, mechanics have their own tool boxes with the basics, but they don't provide their own lifts, alignment racks, diagnostic software, etc.

It's pretty similar to the system I'm in, I provide my own monitors, keyboards, desk, chair, etc, while my company provides my laptop, software and cloud platform.

"Did you know that car mechanics have to buy their own tools? Can you imagine developing software and having to bring your own computer and devices?"

There are BYOD companies. They would probably be more common if licensing and security didn't matter.

Yes and no the the own tools thing. It depends on the shop and the type of tools. Their own wrenches, sockets, and other small tools might make sense (especially if they avoid Snap-On). The air tool infrastructure, lifts, alignment rack, tire mounting/balancing machine, etc are all shop supplied.

If a company makes you BYOD, you should be able to bill them for wear, just like how you bill them for gas and wear to your personal vehicle when they make you drive to a conference or something else like that.

My simplistic mental model of our society is the motion of celestial bodies under the force of greed. The upside is that greed keeps things in motion. The downside is that eventually those thing tend to form big clumps that pull the surrounding matter at the rate proportional to the size of the clump. The anti-trust laws are supposed to be intelligent forces that break up such clumps. There is, probably, an equivalent of the black hole: an indestructible organisation with such force of greed that nothing can escape it; in practice it would be some unholy union of state and business, a corporation that writes laws for itself, has an army and doesn't answer to anyone.

> it would be some unholy union of state and business, a corporation that writes laws for itself, has an army and doesn't answer to anyone.

William Gibson liked the term "Zaibatsu"[0].

See also the textbook definitions of "neoliberalism", and "fascism".

[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zaibatsu

> the motion of celestial bodies under the force of greed

This is pretty much his Aristotle thought the planets moved … by angels/demons motivated by greed.

I loved studying Aristotle, but the man could think himself into a hole.

Edit: the intelligences move the celestial spheres “as ends” - that is, their being desired (not their desiring) causes them to move the the celestial spheres. Sorry for the confusion on that.

Bringing your own tools can have massive benefits as long as the pay is in line with owning those tools. The biggest issue is starting capital, as is the true for the status quo unless your educational institute provides free devices. Of course there are limits (you probably shouldn't be expected to own your own mocap lab), but most individuals will already have a device given the relatively low price even with company-provided materials.

The issue being more, these things are removed without giving anything else in return.

> Having to own the latest iPhone just to test on, because the company won't provide it but expects iOS compatibility?

The previous company I was in did mostly require bringing in a personal smartphone to function. As I didn't own one, that caused all kinds of amusing (to me) commotion. Eventually some workarounds were set up.

But that should be non-negotiable. If company needs me to have $FOO to work, company must pay and give me said $FOO.

> Did you know that car mechanics have to buy their own tools? Can you imagine developing software and having to bring your own computer and devices?

IANAL at all, but from my own research a few years back, part of the contractor test in North America and other countries is “who is providing and paying for the tools”. And when the answer is “not me”, it’s a strong indicator you’re an employee. Ergo if you’re an employee, the employer must pay for the tools to do the job (as in legally must)

Absent a union it’s really hard to enforce those rules

True. But it seems like the wind is turning a little in the US about unions.

My understanding of the mechanics with their own tools was for the practical matter of stopping theft/damage.

You’re much more likely to keep your tools in working order and not let them walk away if they’re your tools.

Equipment the shop supplies is less likely to walk away. Like a 100gal air compressor or car lift.

The contractor tests differ between fields though. The laws were written specifically to go after the big software consulting industry that appears a few decades ago to force them to become employees. They grandfathered in other job roles that were historically operating over the line one way or another.

The “who provides the tools?” is just one test among several, which is not enough to conclude the employer legally must provide tools to employees under all circumstances.

This is one of the better HN comments I’ve ever read on labor matters. Cheers.

> This is due to the tendency of the rate of profit to fall. When efficiency gains mean that a business's main costs are labor, then attempts to increase profit will be focused on cutting labor costs.

I think it is better characterized as demand for labor falling relative to supply of labor. Obviously everyone wants to cut all costs all the time, but whether or not they can depends on supply and demand.

> Obviously everyone wants to cut all costs all the time

Why would this be obvious? I've worked in companies whose revenue grew so quickly that no one could be bothered to cut existing costs. It literally wouldn't be cost effective to do anything but grow revenue.

Cutting costs is just one half of the equation.

Outside of VC pump and dump markets, business owners are incentivized to increase net income = revenue - expenses for their own utility and because they have competitors who are working to lure their customers by offering lowering prices.

It is possible that in an explosive growth business area with little to zero marginal costs, focusing solely on revenue and ignoring costs in the short term makes sense, but it is not sustainable. Even then, there is never a blank check for labor costs so someone somewhere will notice a number being too high.

You've echoed my point exactly. Different scenarios call for different approaches. Cutting costs is only one half of the equation.