alt Hacker NewsWhat they're describing is that TVs had consumable items in the circuitry. It isn't possible to have had a TV without tubes. Tubes were basically really fancy lightbulbs and had a finite life. No amount of quality could make consumables not necessary. TVs needed maintenance and manual back then. They sucked. It's like saying that buying a higher quality car means you don't need to buy tires.
The broader point is that we think that things lasted longer back then because of survivorship bias, but on the whole they really didn't. The incredible old fridge in grandpas garage is incredible because it was an exception. 100k miles used to be a car that was ready for the wrecker. You used to have to get tune-ups several times per year where points, timing, carburetors, spark plugs, and other things needed replacing or adjusting. That's why every gas station had a mechanic. Now, half those things have been replaced by more reliable longer lasting mechanisms that adjust themselves, and the stuff that still exists like spark plugs last for years instead of months.
The highest quality stuff from back then doesn't really stack up to many modern things, especially if you pay the same inflation adjusted price.
From your list:
clothes: higher quality, several times more expensive (inflation adjusted. Levis 501 were $90 adjusted in 1975, Amazon has them for $45)
furniture: cheap shit and expensive stuff was available, just like now
power tools: almost universally, I would trade old corded, brushed tools for new cordless brushless. Old machine tools are the exception where old is as good as new.
phones: you didn't have a choice, the phone company gave you whatever they had in stock and charged you a monthly fee for the privilege.
spices: less variety and freshness. Good luck getting spices that weren't part of your local cuisine.
perfume: no idea
refrigerators: incredibly inefficient, harmful chemicals, and today you can still buy a VERY nice fridge if you are willing to pay what a shitty fridge from 1975 would have cost ($2,200 inflation adjusted for the cheapest one from sears).
light fixtures: same as furniture, you get what you pay for then and now
record players: see furniture
guitars: see furniture
lawn mower: see furniture
The enshitiffication of known brands is a real problem today, but that doesn't mean that everything was perfect and known back then.
I wasn't saying things were better then than now. I was saying exactly what you're saying - cheap shit and expensive stuff was available, see furniture, see furniture, see furniture.
Except no, it's like that anymore. It's literally impossible - and I mean literally literally - to find any mass-produced brand (as in not needing to be custom made) of furniture that consistently, across all its products, will last more than warranty period. I haven't been an adult for that long, and I've had multiple beds break down under me and multiple sofas sag down entirely. And no, none of them were cheap. I paid extra specifically to avoid this kind of thing. It didn't work. And there's no alternative for me, literally nowhere I can buy furniture that doesn't break down unless I make it myself or pay some craftsman to.