What Makes Watches Worth The Money?

Watch Snob: Why Do Watches Really Cost So Much?

This past weekend, I came across an opinion piece in the Globe and Mail written by Princeton bioethicist Peter Singer about “conspicuous consumption.” I seem to recall, from a philosophy course I took at Le Rosey many years ago, a book on the syllabus by the same Dr. Singer that focused on the ethics of eating animals. Clearly, the man has many bones to pick or, as the case may be given his vegetarian predilections, too few. The point of his argument seemed to simply be a Cliff’s Notes of the now rather dog-eared 1899 paper from Veblen, "The Theory of the Leisure Class" (also Philosophy 101 required reading), in which the main point is that when societies value wealth as the pinnacle of achievement, the rich must display it through the purchase of expensive items. No argument from me there. It seems a sound theory and entirely in keeping with the Marxist philosophies Mr. Veblen espoused. How’s Marxism working out, by the way? I didn’t think so.

What did manage to raise my eyebrow, if not my blood pressure, was Dr. Singer’s use of the mechanical watch as a vehicle for his argument. He cites a recent example of a Polish minister being ridiculed for wearing a quartz watch to a meeting in Ukraine, where his counterparts all wore expensive timepieces. Dr. Singer says this, “The laughter should have gone in the opposite direction. Wouldn’t you laugh… at someone who pays more than 200 times as much as you do, and ends up with an inferior product?” He goes on to trot out the ignorant and simplistic argument that a quartz watch keeps better time and is maintenance-free compared to a chiming minute repeater from Patek Philippe, and thus is a better product. I’m not so naïve as to be knowingly drawn into a debate with a celebrated philosophy professor but I must protest, Dr. Singer.

To be fair, the point of the opinion article was to point out the absurdity of the Ukrainian ministers’ ownership of expensive watches when the majority of the people they represent live in poverty. But that is an argument about how the ministers get their money and how they spend it. Leave the watches out of it. If Dr. Singer wants to debate the merits of the mechanical watch and why many people, yours truly included, prefer it to the cheap quartz watch, I encourage him to write to me separately and leave the corrupt Ukrainians behind.

I could pull out the high-minded ecological and societal argument, in which the use of plastics and short-lived circuit boards and batteries result in irresponsible, disposable watches that will seep into the soil long after those expensive timepieces the Ukrainians have passed down to their children are still ticking. How many cheap watches will the sainted Polish minister buy over the years and what will become of those that stop working? And then there is the unskilled labor that stamps these watches out by the millions in factories strategically placed in countries that work for the least. Is there not some value one can place on the skilled watchmaker, paid a fair wage, to construct an object that is built from durable materials to last?

But I suspect that many of us who place value on a well-made mechanical timepiece do so not out of a desire to appear wealthy or to tell the most accurate time. We value them for the same reason people value fine art or a well-designed, functional tool. The mechanical watch is a timeless representation — nay, a celebration, if I may be so grandiose — of man’s ingenuity. To capture time by means of a set of gears is a remarkable feat that should never grow obsolete, even if a battery-powered watch can be marginally more accurate. And by the way, Dr. Singer, a fine mechanical watch can be 99.999% accurate.

There is a disturbing trend in the world toward planned obsolescence and low prices above all else, including craftsmanship, durability and design. In fact, in an ironic counterargument to Dr. Singer and his hero, Veblen, I would dare say there is a reverse version of conspicuous consumption in which the cheap quartz watch becomes a person’s emblem of humility, fiscal responsibility and sensibility. To me, it only says cheap, fleeting and wasteful. Of course, not everyone who wears a cheap watch is doing so consciously. They might genuinely lack funds, knowledge or, most likely, taste. And I can’t speak for the Ukrainian ministers, but it is ignorant and an unsound argument to lump all those who wear fine timepieces as doing so for the shallow reasons suggested in the Globe and Mail article.

I have no desire to dabble in the high-minded ethics of world economics, Eastern European government corruption or even animal rights. But get me started on watches, and regular readers know that I can run on a bit. And as much as I would love to continue this argument, my Patek repeater has just made me aware that I’m late for dinner and suddenly I’m craving red meat, with a nice big bone to pick.