> especially in a world where higher price does not necessarily equate to higher quality or longer life.

There's the kicker; how can you tell when something is better quality anymore? Qualifiers like "is this device run at max capacity or is there leeway" are never listed on packaging or product features.

It's often hard to know, especially for items you're not going to individually research in great depth, whether you're actually paying for quality or for a name on the package even though it actually came off the same assembly line in China as any number of knock-offs. And, even if it is higher quality by some standard, does that really affect consumer outcomes?

I do not, nor will I ever, excuse penny-pinching by companies by agreeing that they’re forced to do it because people will always buy the cheapest thing they can. It’s trotted out as the lame excuse for bag check fees and other declining flying services, cheap consumer goods, cheap electronics, you name it.

To accept the premise is to believe that anything made of quality will never get bought/used which is manifestly not the case. And it strangely completely ignores the incentives companies have to make things as shitty as possible, namely lower expenses and planned obsolescence.

>To accept the premise is to believe that anything made of quality will never get bought/used which is manifestly not the case.

I disagree. It is a ratio of quality to price. People have different opinions about what the acceptable minimum ratio is, and it varies by product, and by time. For example, many people find Costco to hit the right ratio most of the time.

For example, I have been using LEDs and dimmable LEDs from soft white (~2700K) to cool white (~4000K) with no problem, all purchased at Home Depot/Lowes/Costco. Some have failed earlier than anticipated, but nowhere near enough to cancel out the cost savings.

And it's a matter of individual consumer priorities.

Some consumers will happily pay for business class seating on planes. Others will generally overlook inconvenience and less comfort if they can save $50.

Yes, another example is clothing. I have no interest in buying high quality clothing that I have to spend time taking care of. I want whatever lasts longest, while still being able to throw in the washer and dryer on default settings without having to separate colors.

The problem is evaluating quality before purchase. There's not a great way of expressing the sorts of factors that differentiate between good and bad LED bulbs that consumers can easily understand, let alone anything to encourage different manufacturers to use the same measurements. If the consumer can't tell what is quality, what's to get them to spend the money for it?