The problem with all this, is that all those takes are true to an extent.

For instance: I may spend $80 or even $40 to get a guitar to start learning, but my experience across many areas tells me that spending those $100-200 more will buy me a guitar that I won't actively hate. Which is important early on when learning something. Even more important is to avoid confusing tool deficiencies for lack of skill, which is easy if you never get to compare what you have with what is actually good. So basically, there is great value in not having to fight your tools - mechanically, cognitively, or emotionally.

Another thing: tools, in general, have positive "y-intercept" for non-negative amount of skills. That is, even someone with zero experience in a field will produce better results with better tools. In some cases, better results than pros with no tools[0].

Another thing still, though very close to the first case: while "more expensive = better" generally doesn't hold, and especially doesn't when the target customer base isn't known for their reasoning skills, it's still often enough a good heuristic that "more expensive = less bullshit". See also: "I'm too poor to buy cheap".

> A few years ago people were scoffing at Macron, the President of France, buying 300$ suits. I can't count how often I've seen ordinary guys spend more on a suit going to events were nobody could even tell the difference.

Maybe it's you who couldn't? In clothing, there are couple quality/price levels clearly apparent to the eye, though perhaps not if you've never worn anything at that level. And beyond that, the price bracket of someone's suit is something you'll learn indirectly, from random gossip, if you're in the crowd that cares. And that is the reason people spend that money on suits (or expensive cars) - they're in, or trying to break into, a peer group that cares, because those suits/dresses/cars/whatnot are status symbols. Social signals difficult to falsify. Basically, the OG "Proof of Work" scheme.

> Tools are sometimes important, but 80-90% it's about the proficiency of the wielder. And this is completely skewed because that kind of reality does not sell, and selling people more stuff is now the primary objective of a lot of televised sports, music what have you.

OTOH, I came to believe that what you say is also a fake reality - one of "MacGyverism". It's a ego/status trading reality. "A true pro doesn't need to read instructions." "Amateurs obsess over tools, pros obsess over mastery." "A bad ballerina is bothered by the hem of her skirt." Yes, mastery means you can do the job without adequate tools. But it also means you'll instead first try and get the right tools, because there's little point in making the process more difficult and risky.

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[0] - Such cases are somewhat infrequent and definitely small-scale, because any such case represents money left on the table, which the market quickly captures when it spots it. Some examples, however, include:

- Me beating handymen on a repair job, despite having no relevant skills, by virtue of having right tools on hand (and caring about the outcome).

- People writing complex data processing monstrosities in Excel, because even if you have zero programming skills, Excel can get you much further than you could ever get by asking the IT department for help.

- IANAHistorian, but my high-level understanding of the history of warfare was that rifles, early on, were really really bad, barely above throwing a rock at someone. However, they displaced archers and armored knights because while the latter two roles were much more lethal, they required many years of concentrated training - meanwhile, you could hand a rifle to a random peasant, tell them which end the bullets come out of (and how to put new ones in), and you'd have an effective fighter.

- The elephant in the room: random Internet anon with access to Stable Diffusion > plenty of artists in many contexts. Same with anon + LLM and marketing copywriters.

- EDIT: more historical examples include: reading, writing, numbers, basic maths (of the type kids learn by rote), calculators, measuring tools, precisely manufactured tools. All of which gave huge baseline boost to people who used them, regardless of their experience.