Yes, your average Swede would rather live in the woods than have 80's tiles. Meanwhile an average american would perhaps rather have 4 80's baths than 2 new ones. And that's exactly the cultural difference the article is about I think. It goes part of the way to describing why I only have 1.5 bathrooms.

I also suppose there is a difference with wear. If you have e.g. one or two baths instead of 3 or four for a large family, then it might be in worse condition after 15 years.

Actually now that you mention it the bathrooms in Sweden when I visited were notably magical.

Maybe the author of the article should write about how many bathrooms Swedes have, installed in series every 10 years rather than in parallel when the house is built. A one bathroom house where the bathroom has been replaced 4 times in 40 years counts as 4 bathrooms.