"You Get What You Pay For"

"You get what you pay for" a certain sort of person likes to say--usually to other people who have just been disappointed by a purchase, for whom the words are no comfort. (Rather this is a case of kicking someone while they are down.)

The truth is that, contrary to the price-worshipping market fundamentalism implicit in the phrase, we do not always get what we pay for. Sometimes we get more--especially when we are in a position to exploit others (a concept market fundamentalists pretend is meaningless). In other cases--probably more common for the great majority of us--we get less than we paid for. Which makes someone's quipping "You get what you pay for" in such a moment proof of their idiocy.