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Nhaa I had a 70 year old Norwegian electrical stove in the old place I rented. No cannot convince me a new electrical stove last that long based on survivorship bias alone. There is something called inflation, and planned obsolescence rejecting you claim.
Old things were also often prohibitively expensive. Hardly anyone owned anything, and everything was shared by lots of people. My Grandpa's bed was solid and lasted a long time, but 6 people slept in it, at a time. Crowded in like sardines and sometimes kids would fall right off. And there was one truck for 9 people and the kids rode in the open bed. Every bump in the road was life-threatening. People died in car accidents, constantly, even though the cars were glacially slow. Total death traps. And they guzzled gas like crazy. Nobody misses that old bed. Nobody misses that old truck.
↩ replying to Laeserin 🇻🇦
You miss it a little when you work on a new truck. There can be middle grounds that optimize for the good parts of each. Modern vehicles have went far in one direction. Most are not durable or repairable now, and many of the efficiencies come at the cost of major repairs (often making the vehicle disposable) a lot sooner. Safety has been a good gain though. Having the car crush instead of occupants is much better. But shit like plastic oil pans and drain plugs that barely screw in are ridiculous when those parts failing costs an entire engine. Like most things, it's not all or nothing. Fiat doesnt help. Mass production is also an issue. We have more people than we used to.
Maybe not, but many things from past production used better materials and are simpler to repair. I've seen it in vehicles and many other things. Nothing lasts forever in every environment, but I call bullshit on the idea that things have always been as shitty as they are now. It is also true that things get replaced due to new features, efficiency, etc but that doesn't mean there won't be other downsides. One being reparability and complexity. New and old are neither always good or bad. But in general, quality and repairability have taken the backseat. Most things I see now seem to be disposable. Some of that is due to complexity demand (more stuff in a thing is harder to repair). Most is just fiat nonsense, in my opinion.
↩ replying to [Redacted]
A lot is cost. The populations using the things have absolutely exploded in number and they managed to drive down the real price of everything, while still responding quickly to the increased demand. People complain about quality, but they also complain about supply shortages and rising prices. Something has to give. One reason real estate prices are so high is because the prices of consumer goods are so low. The money leftover went into investment-grade goods, driving up their prices.
↩ replying to [Redacted]
You see it with vehicle markets in the US. People shop based on monthly payment now, which makes it easier for total sale price to soar. With almost decade long loans and high interest. Beautiful. Cash payers like me get fucked. For now. Distortions like that always break eventually. We are seeing increases in repos and missed payments now, as expected.
Yes and no. All that I restore are more than 50 years old. Nothing I see now withstands that. Also: almost all materials were “eco artisan friendly “ MEANING could be fixed/replaced/machined. Now mostly all dumped after 5 years cycles.
Yes ... quality things last longer and still exist centuries later. The older, crappier stuff falls apart and gets tossed out. This gives the appearance that everything old was made of high quality. Then there are old farts that experienced the general higher quality from decades ago, and know for a fact that things were generally higher quality back then.