"In the EU and at least 18 U.S. states, regulators are starting to listen and considering proposals that address the impact of planned obsolescence by making household goods sturdier and easier to mend, reports the BBC," according to Fortune magazine.
Our economic system rewards manufacturers for making crap, protects their unfair proprietary "rights" through regulation, and then allows them to abdicate responsibility for the costs to both the environment and the economy when built-in obsolescence takes over and their spent products end up in landfalls. And while both present-day consumers and future generations pay the price for this, giant corporations take their profits to the bank.
My grandmother had a lightbulb in her front hallway that was there when she and my grandfather moved into their house in 1940; it was still there when my mother sold her house in 1970. That may have been unusual longevity, but when I compare it to the squirrelly bulbs I now have to buy which are supposed to last for 18 years but rarely last for 18 months, it speaks to the quality of manufacture. Another illustration is the basement fridge that my mother bought used or reconditioned in 1967 that was still keeping the beer cold in 2012 when we sold her house. Manitoba Hydro would have paid her $50 to carry it away and get a more energy efficient model, but how much energy is wasted by sending processed metal and plastics to the landfill?
Major appliances, computers, televisions, automobiles, furnaces, furniture, clothing – everywhere we turn, we've happily substituted quality for crap. And the planet in increasingly buried in our waste.
The 'Right to Repair' Movement Is Gaining Ground and Could Hit Manufacturers Hard
