Turns out they thought ArcGIS cost the same as like Office or Acrobat, and they didn’t budget for it for the fiscal year that started 2 weeks before I started working.
ESRI is in the position that Microsoft and Adobe want to be in, a de-facto monopoly.
One of those entities claims to be on the side of users. When it constantly throws those same users under the bus anyway, it isn’t surprising that it gets more hate than the entity that removed “don’t be evil” from its motto.
It’s not our fault that fascists bleed when liberals get scratched.