$250 (the initial all-you-can-gobble) is a day's wages or less for anybody making more than $62500 (post-tax) per annum, which at least in the US is not a lot at all.
That $250 isn't (generally) tax-deductible. At the moment, I'm making ~€80k as a SWE in Belgium (reasonably good pay but not the highest), and my net income is closer to €150/day. At the top of my career, I expect that I could increase that to at most €200/day because taxation is brutal.
This is not to say that I don't pay for tools; I subscribe to the full Jetbrains set among other things. It's just that that wasn't as simple of a decision as you present it.
Is it not in Belgium? In Germany you can count this as 'Werbungskosten' which you can deduct from your income. Anything you use for your job or for professional development counts as this type of expense. Don't other countries have similar concepts in their tax systems?
This is not to say that I don't pay for tools; I subscribe to the full Jetbrains set among other things. It's just that that wasn't as simple of a decision as you present it.