Do you have any suggestions how at least a single consumer would initiate a demand for reliability? And how would a manufacturer declare and prove they indeed include reliability in their products?

If I could choose between a $1000 appliance with a 10-year warranty and a $500 one with a 5-year warranty I know what I'd go with. But that sort of choice is virtually never available.

I missed this comment, sorry for the late reply. A warranty system guarantees for free repairs or replacements but doesn't guarantee for a reliable product.

Plus choosing a $1000 for a 10-year warranty would be a very bad deal, since $500 guarantees you 5-year product, additional working time or ability to sell and repurchase of an improved version of a product. Minus could be inflation or less reliable product in the future.

Except that there's basically no way to know which products are going to be more reliable!

You can use price as some kind of signal, but it's only loosely correlated. Manufacturers use a dizzying array of different model numbers that change constantly, so it's impossible to buy a model that's been in the field long enough to have a meaningful track record.

You can probably figure out that some brands are basically always junk, but even the brands that do make higher quality products also sometimes make junk, so good luck...

> Except that there's basically no way to know which products are going to be more reliable!

The fact that basically all manufacturers offer the same fairly pathetic warranties (and that extended ones cost absurd amounts) should give you some idea that basically all products out there are made with similar expectations as to how long they'll last before something breaks.

I'd argue that's still part of the consumer's responsibility to vote with their wallet, since part of what makes a brand a brand is its reputation.

This has long been the case for cars, where Japanese brands focused on reliability and were able to outcompete less reliable brands when new, and command higher prices in the used car market. Many Japanese brands are now no more reliable than their domestic counterparts, but that doesn't mean they're unreliable, and consumers are still voting with their wallets based on their past experience.

Bringing this back to home appliances, when my parents purchased their home, it came with a fancy-looking Samsung fridge, which broke shortly after the warranty period. That meant that when it came time to purchase my own fridge, I wrote off Samsung completely. Additionally, my parents purchased a nice LG washing machine, which has been running great for well over a decade now, and again when it came time to purchase my own, I went with LG. None of these were the cheapest, and I as a consumer voted with my wallet.