You see the resilient things at your grandparents' house because those are the only things that have survived. All the poor quality things they purchased over the years are gone by now. Also, you and your parents probably favor lower-cost items (as do most people these days) over longevity. This may simply not have been possible in your grandparents' time, pre-globalization. It's still very possible to get high-quality and long-lasting goods (the buyitforlife subreddit is a good starting point), but you're going to pay a lot more for them than most people are willing to in comparison to the "replace it when it breaks" mass-produced-in-China goods.
Today, we have been in a period of rapid change as technology advances. My grandparents bought the best of the analog world. Their CRT TVs were the peak of consumer sets. The world switched to LCDs when I was looking to buy a TV, which took a long time to catch up to the height of CRTs (not until OLED in my opinion). Their film cameras took exceptional pictures. Only recently have most consumer DSLRs begun to achieve the same level of quality. Their cars had battle-tested V6 engines while the cars I looked at had newer, unproven inline 4 engines that came with carbon build up issues.
So a mix of survivorship bias and cost preference but also the current state of the market. Fortunately for me, I have been able to purchase a nice PVM to play my old video game consoles on, have made use of my grandfather’s film camera and can develop the film at a local studio, and am able to buy a used car with a proven V6 engine since they are still available in the market. When buying products that will hopefully last, I first look to what my grandparents own as a starting point. Often, purchasing older goods let me take advantage of those points you mentioned.
For a current product on the market that is pretty great, I have been pleased with a Moccamaster coffee maker.
The problem is that it has become increasingly difficult to discern if something will last.
An expensive product, from what was a trusted brand, can be just as short lived as a cheap one these days. Cost does not always reflect quality.
And brands that build long-lived products struggle as they don't have the repeat customers of products that are good, but contain forced obsolescence features.
It's a hidden cost to consumers that is often hard to figure out without extensive research.
I know of a company that was a national leader in a certain kind of industrial equipment. Now that the industry isn't expanding in this country, they can't sell anything because what they sold decades ago was designed for excellence and just won't die. Nearly all business now is occasional servicing of their old equipment.
I wonder if the original saying has been translated multiple times before getting to English.
There's a useful function in limited lifespan - things are much easier to update and upgrade. My tastes have changed a lot over the past 20 years. If my clothes lasted longer I'd have a wardrobe full of things I don't like now and wouldn't wear. If my TV lasted 20 years I'd still have an old, inefficient SD CRT box in the corner, or I'd have passed it on to someone else and maybe they'd have scrapped a functioning item now.
It's less true for basic things like toasters and pots and pans, but I suspect the lower quality is partly due to being cheaper to make and therefore more accessible. If everything is made well and costs more then wealthy people have things that last and poor people don't have things. Cheaper things balances that inequality a little.
Societal context is important here.
Did your taste really changed on itself or did the constant marketing pressure changed your taste for clothes and your expectations for what is an acceptable TV ?
I mean : of course, I’m a tech enthusiast : I love big modern OLED screens, I love 4K movies and beautiful video games. I’m truly amazed by what we can do.
But, does all of this makes me truly happier than when I played with my Nintendo 64 on a cheap CRT screen ? I don’t think so. The pleasure I feel playing video games alone and with my friends never changed with technology evolution.
And it’s just an example that can apply to mostly everything. We just change things because we are encouraged to by marketers. Sometimes things are more robust or more efficient and that’s really worth changing, but that’s pretty uncommon.
That’s IMO what’s driving a lot of technological advancement it’s not necessarily about needing progress as it is separating yourself from the profit maximization processes which makes most things worse over time. Tiny companies don’t have inherent advantages when it comes to say food, but they don’t have the expertise to perfectly maximize shelf life while keeping the food reasonably palatable.
It the same maximization causes Windows and smart TV’s to include so much advertising because it’s maximizing their profits at the expense of the product. But you don’t see that in new categories like AR headsets.
There’s a local TV/internet provider who rolled out a new system of TV boxes. They compete with the big giant who had “4K” at the time. This provider sent out a signal that was 720P natively but it looked way better due to the rock-solid bitrate that was planned from the beginning. It was so noticeable that sports on the big giant’s boxes were a smeary blurry mess by comparison. And yet, the majority of bigger-spending customers still got pulled in by the “4k” marketing.
It's not that much more difficult to periodically clean out your wardrobe and donate it compared to throwing it in the trash.
Do you think people are getting new suits because they are "worn out", or perhaps because they're no longer in style?
>Their technics AV components still work with their high quality speakers.
I'll bet modern engineered speakers will beat those high quality speakers, at a fraction of the price. That's modernity.
You'd be surprised how shitty most "modern" speakers are.
Size is still king. Doesn't matter how fast your fancy microcontrollers are. The big-ass cabinets from the 80s and 90s still sound incredible when you put them next to the typical experience you'd find on the shelves of Target or Best Buy.
Often the woofer on the speaker is larger than a modern 5.1 subwoofer.
However, it is frustrating that I can't get modern speakers anything like my parents' three-ways with a 12 or 15 inch woofer without finding some esoteric offering.
You can get "modern" builds of the very same loudspeakers right now with major brands like Klipsch - https://www.klipsch.com/heritage-premium-audio The AK6 is still considered by many to be the best loudspeaker you can ever own.
Mainly because the market did large speakers is so much smaller now. Feels like the price/quality trade off is about the same as it was 40 years ago.
The speakers that are “a fraction of the price” now are there, but they’re really terrible Chinese-made junk for the most part.
My grandfather still has his Hickey Freeman suits and sports coats tailored and repaired by a local menswear shop. Their Dualit toaster still works while I have personally gone through many Cuisinart toasters. Their technics AV components still work with their high quality speakers. Their Sony Trinitron TVs still work. Their pots and pans from their wedding are still in active use. Their Pyrex continues to store leftovers decades on. I am currently using the Minolta film camera and lens that my grandfather bought in the 80s for traveling around the world with.
When I go to their home, I am always in awe of the high quality objects that still function perfectly fine and can all be passed down. When I look at many of the things my parents own and most of the things I own, I see less and less of that. Our clothes are cheaper. Our pans less resilient. Our technology is less repairable.
Buying well certainly leads to a longer lifespan for objects. However, I find that’s becoming tougher and tougher to find these days.