What's your opinion on dressing nice in casual scenarios? (Ex. School, Work..)

I would like to know what you think of dressing nice every day and people you see who do dress nice in every day places. (Does it seem pretentious, impractical..) I'd also like to know what degree of dress you would call acceptable in these situations.

Edit: Some information about me is that I'm in America and what I personally wanted to take away from the answers was not suits but more button ups and nice sweaters. I didn't want this to affect your answers though because I enjoy hearing your opinions on different degrees of dress.