Or when it starts to fall apart. Generally the knives outside the budget range are built to last a lot longer with everyday use as well. To me, its worth the extra money for a higher quality tool. There is a point of diminishing return, but staying somewhere in the middle works for me. I think a lot of it goes toward pride of ownership, which non knife knuts really don't care about, but the members here for the most part do.
Yeah, but you can buy a $30.00 knife that has a great warranty. I'll use the Buck Vantage Select Small in 420HC for an example. It comes with the "Buck Forever Warranty"- should the thing fail for some reason, other than due to user error or misuse. Then they will repair or replace the knife based on their own inspection.