TomD
It explains part of it. As with my other post, there are different uses for all kinds of tools. You have certain kinds of elite tools like Japanese woodworking tools; You have serious tools, the butcher knives, as far as I know they are all stainless these days; And you get crap that is sold to punters but works well, serrated edge miracle knives; and you get stuff that doesn't work.

Scythes are an interesting example, They need to not only to be very sharp, but the edge angle profile needs to be very thin. To keep that with repeated sharpenings requires constant peening of the edge to draw out a new feather. Therefore the steel needs to be soft, which does to a certain extent lead one in a vicious circle. There are Japanese hard edge scythes, but I don't really see them being used in entirely the same way, on hundreds of acres of grain.

I would caution about saying stuff about stainless, there are very good SS. They are so good there is little practical reason for anything else, in most knives. But then as with anything else people root out uses that require different materials. Like cutting dovetail pins super thin allows one to keep flying the flag for hand tools. I like that this happens because I can make simple carbon knives with domestic heat treating and a sense of superiority.

The other reason not to dis SS is that it is always on a continuum from unsharpenable salt water dive knives, through to some of the toughest most edge holding steels there are like D2, which ranks as partially stainless in many people's minds.

There was an interesting event in knives. They had pushed 440c so hard that it was very popular, but for whatever reason was scarce one year. A couple of big makers changed their production to 420, the previous holder of the "pure crap" label. But the 420 knives turned out to be just as good. The explanation was that it was all about intentions and picking the right heat treating protocol. The world is almost always more complicated than a sales brochure.