That's human nature, not capitalism. Remember the socialist republics of the 20th century? Their goods were shoddier still, because they didn't have enough competition to keep them honest.

Boy that is one of the most inaccurate definition of capitalism I have ever heard. By your definition there would not be any quality product left in US or in any free market. As others state, this is human behavior. Most people does not care about the quality of the trivial items, so they prefer cheap but functioning goods. For niche consumers, prices will be high and production will be less. There are however things block actual capitalism to function well, such as protectionist policies that prevents you importing superb Japanese staples and pens cheaply.

Yeah absolutely. There's definitely no market for high quality items and people are most decidedly not willing to pay extra for quality. Nope, everyone wants the exact same mass produced crap, which is why everyone shops only at the dollar store and why the terms handmade, handcrafted, and artisinal are now in the popular lexicon.

Hold on, there's no "mass" market for high quality items. If you want extreme quality handmade stuff you can find it, but you may need to look for it rather than just go to "box store" and you pay a lot more.