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Generation Junk

walterkirn.substack.com

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Re: Generation Junk

#181

Post by shepherdjerred »

pixl97 wrote: post #155
shepherdjerred wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a mind-boggling anecdote. As an example, Crate and Barrel are known to make good, high-quality couches, and many of them are far less than $5000

Can you get them these days? I was looking at some C&B stuff during the pandemic 2 years ago and they were looking at 7 to 8 month delivery times.

My friend bought a townhouse in Seattle just a few months ago, and bought a C&B (very nice) couch for it at around $3000. It was delivered within a week or two of ordering, so I believe they're available.

When I bought my couch in late 2019 it was also delivered within a couple of weeks.

Are you custom ordering something? I believe that common configurations ship immediately, but any kind of customization requires that multiple-month lead time.

Re: Generation Junk

#182

Post by kube-system »

Pxtl wrote: post #152
kube-system wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I would argue that a $250 toaster today is still not a "buy it for life" item, but it would certainly have a lot of bells and whistles and almost no user-serviceable parts. Not if you buy one that is $250 because it has bells and whistles . You can buy a $250 dollar toaster that is just a toaster and it will be of good quality. https://www.webstaurantstore.com/waring-wct708-4-slice-comme...

This is a good point: The problem isnt that long lasting, durable products no longer exist. It's that they're no longer marketed for home use. You can get stuff just as good as back in the '60s, for comparable after-inflation prices. But they don't sell them at Sears or HomeSense, they sell them at industrial or kitchen or office supply stores.

The thing is, if someone decided to stock that toaster on the shelf at Target, it wouldn't sell. Most people make so little toast that the words "duty cycle" or "slices per hour" are not even in their vocabulary. People are simply making purchasing decisions with a higher weight on other criteria.

Maybe, for the environment's sake, people should be buying and using appliances for 70 years. But do people actually want a kitchen full of appliances that are 35 years old on average? Probably not, thrift shops are still full of contemporarily made appliances that were discarded before their useful life ended.

Re: Generation Junk

#183

Post by shepherdjerred »

xp84 wrote: post #175
shepherdjerred wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a mind-boggling anecdote. As an example, Crate and Barrel are known to make good, high-quality couches, and many of them are far less than $5000

I went to try to see conclusively if you were correct. A pretty basic sofa at C&B is $1,800 - $2,000. In 1990 you could buy a basic Bassett sofa at J.C. Penney for $599 [1] -- $1407 in 2023 dollars. Furniture from Sears and Penney's (regardless of whether it was fashionable) was of fine quality, in that it held up for decades. I know because we had furniture like this in our home at the time. So this tells me that th…

My only point was that today you don't need to spend $5000 for a "good" couch. I don't know about the historical context.

Re: Generation Junk

#184

Post by don_neufeld »

I wonder: is this person incredibly bad at making purchases? I mean… just incredibly bad? Or do they not do maintenance?

The LG washer and Dryer I bought 20 yrs ago still works a champ.

Come to think of it, the only appliance I’ve had issue with in the last 20 years is my coffee grinder, which after about 10 years of heavy use I sent to Baratazza and paid for it repaired.

So I’m just not seeing this, even a little bit.

Re: Generation Junk

#185

Post by lucas_membrane »

im_down_w_otp wrote: post #68

I’ve had to buy a lot of furniture and other things for my new house this year, and one of the things that really sticks out to me is that practically every category of product seems to be split into a bimodal distribution: cheap crap & luxury boutique. There are practically no entries occupying the middle of the market that are on the basic end regarding features & frills but also high-quality. It’s incredibly annoy…

> absolute trash for less than $1,000 or high-end, high-quality for $5000+

I've been noticing the same thing. But I also suspect that many people pay a little more for stuff, expecting that to make it better. The number of brands and variety of prices one can find on-line is astounding, and it must be much larger than the number of factories in Asia actually making the stuff.

Re: Generation Junk

#186

Post by xp84 »

LiquidPolymer wrote: post #106

We have friends that just laid out $3000 for a new washer drier set and washer is already leaking from the front door. Pursuing warranty repair has been a major hassle. My wife and I use a washer and drier set from the late 90's that are nothing to look at but work really well. They appear to be designed with service in mind and changing components is usually extremely easy - something I have done infrequently. These…

Don't ever even think about replacing them, but if you do want good unbiased reviews do check out this guy:

https://www.youtube.com/@bensappliancesandjunk

I learned a lot from him and when he reports a recommendation, it'll be specific and well-sourced which is important. Still, none of this current garbage will ever compare to a pre-2000 appliance of any kind.

Re: Generation Junk

#187

Post by dw_arthur »

pixl97 wrote: post #177
dw_arthur wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't buy the survivorship bias thing for the most part. My mother has her original dryer, washer, deep freezer, and refrigerator all running at her house. These are all 40+ years old except for the washer which is probably 30ish years old. Also her furnace + water heater are 40 years old. If it was survivorship bias some of these appliances would've died.

I mean, what did your mother pay at that time?, because there was plenty of appliances from back then that were total crap too.

They're name brand appliances, kenmore and whirlpool while the deep freezer is a revco. They don't look like top of the line models, probably just whatever was mid grade at the time. I thought about telling her to throw them away due to power usage but used a kill-a-watt to determine it wasn't worth it. I think the fridge and freezer each cost around $25/year to run.

Re: Generation Junk

#189

Post by fiddlerwoaroof »

dcchambers wrote: post #159

> I can’t say the same about my coffee grinders. I use the plural because I’ve owned a lot of them, all bought in their original packaging and dead within a year. They’re good ones, supposedly, with burrs not blades, but they stop performing before long Anecdotal, but if anyone is looking for a good coffee grinder that doesn't break the bank, can't say enough good things about my Baratza Encore. 10+ years of near dai…

A lot of people dislike the time it takes to use a hand grinder, but I really like the 1zpresso steel burr grinders I own and my Cafelat Robot espresso maker.

Re: Generation Junk

#190

Post by titzer »

I see a lot of comments here defending the current junk culture. Whatever. There's no good reason a pair of scissors that has two steel blades should have a plastic handle, joint, and rivet. Anything with plastic moving parts (e.g. a gear) was intentionally designed to break. It's always done to increase profit, either now, by decreasing cost, or in the long term, by increasing demand by needing a replacement.
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