just becuase you can pick somebody's lock doesn't mean that you have to...
I'd still guess that a large percentage of the paying customers are "paying reluctantly".

Many managers have a real problem with the answer "YES" to "is this investment necessary?"

The problem I have seen in many places is that the budget for one more employee made, necessary by not having proper tools in the facility, is in another column that the budget for e.g. paying Keil a few thousands. I can not count the places I have worked where a modest (in comparison) investment in better tools would save far more in productivity improvements. How much more quality stuff could be produced with "a hammer" instead of "a shoe" for pounding nails.

No, I am not advocating that every engineer should have a $25k scope, a logic analyzer and who knows what, but very seldom have I seen a realistic analysis of the ROI applied to tool purchases.

Erik