MIKE writes:

I’m not sure I buy the thesis that the quality of modern goods is generally lower than it was historically. 

The cars I great up with didn’t really last more than five or six years, despite careful maintenance. I remember repacking wheel bearings, changing oil, and adjusting valve lash on a ’79 Mazda 626 that didn’t last more than 50K miles before the AC failed and the starter stripped the teeth off the flywheel. The ’85 Oldsmobile that replaced it went through two transmissions and a torque converter before my folks finally got sick of the repairs and traded it in. By those standards, the cars my wife and I drive are miracles of reliability, durability, etc. (They’re also cheaper to buy/run and have more safety features, require less maintenance, etc.)

Improvement in technology are even more profound. Prices have come way down, and availability and capability have gone way up. A generation ago, the ‘Thinking Housewife’ would have to be something like a monthly mailing, and I’d be typing a letter on a typewriter rather than sending an e-mail. There is admittedly some charm in the old ways, but I’d be hard pressed to call it an improvement over where we are now.

Regarding mops, etc, I’m less knowledgeable, but I haven’t had much trouble getting quality brooms, shovels, etc. from the local hardware store.

Maybe I’m over-optimistic about these things, but as much as things are going wrong in the world, there’s a lot that’s going right.

Laura writes:

You are right, there are a lot of great products out there. My Apple computer is one of them. Another example is the lightweight, well-built running and hiking shoes you can now buy which are like foot tires and make you feel like you can walk forever. But I don’t think your point obliterates my thesis, which is that in certain areas there is a remarkable pervasiveness of junk products. I don’t like to use the word craftsmanship because it is so old-fashioned and conjures a man in his workshop surrounded by wood shavings, and we all know we can’t go back to that, but ultimately I think these cheap, globalist products are related to the fact that families are under such decline. Our economy does not support labor first. If it did, I believe products themselves would be better.

The cars you mention are probably from Japan and Germany. Obviously much has been written about the superiority of these cars; I do not know enough to say how much the quality is related to the labor conditions there.

I admit, I have not by any means proved my case. But I offer one more absolutely conclusive example of what I am talking about: Pizza!

— Comments —

Casey writes:

It is unquestionable that modern goods in general are of lower quality than pre-industrial ones. Much of this was done deliberately, which is why it’s called planned obsolescence. For proof I recommend the documentary Planned Obsolescence. As Our Lord instructed, we must judge a thing by its fruits, and it is interesting to observe those fruits of industrialization in the film. I think one can easily see that the stock market crash was a punishment by God, which man sought to evade by the worldly wisdom Christ warned us about. What Hurricane Betsy, in the previous thread, calls “civilized” is really a general hatred of temperance, simplicity, and poverty. (And what is so “obvious” to her is not so to someone who studies history and considers what is truly necessary in life.) 19:05 is very eye-opening. All the “jobs” we supposedly need in the modern world we imposed on ourselves, abandoning the beauty of an agricultural world, a way of life rooted in the land, in God’s creation. Yes, as in when the vast majority of people were peasants and we didn’t have a “conventional v. organic” issue.

You wrote: “I don’t like to use the word craftsmanship because it is so old-fashioned and conjures a man in his workshop surrounded by wood shavings, and we all know we can’t go back to that.” Why? Perhaps the world won’t, but why not traditionalists? [Editor’s note: Actually, that comment was not meant in all seriousness. People say housewives are obsolete too!]

Much as I enjoy The Thinking Housewife, I would prefer a society in which edification of its nature were not needed. [Editor’s note: Hey, wait a minute!] I offer the beautiful words of Archbishop Lefebvre:

Cast away, I beg of you, anything which impedes children from entering your family. There is no greater gift that the Good God can bestow upon your hearths than to have many children. Have big families. it is the glory of the Catholic Church—the large family! It has been so in Canada, it has been so in Holland, it has been so in Switzerland and it has been so in France—every-where the large family was the joy and prosperity of the Church. There are that many more chosen souls for heaven! Therefore do not limit, I beg you, the gifts of God; do not listen to these abominable slogans which destroy the family, which ruin health, which ruin the household, and provoke divorce.

 And I wish that, in these troubled times, in this degenerate urban atmosphere in which we are living, that you return to the land whenever possible. The land is healthy; the land teaches one to know God; the land draws one to God; it calms temperaments, characters, and encourages the children to work.

 And if it is necessary, yes, you yourselves will make the school for your children. If the schools should corrupt your children, what are you going to do? Deliver them to the corrupters? To those who teach these abominable sexual practices in the schools? To the so-called “Catholic” schools run by religious men and women where they simply teach sin? In reality that is what they are teaching to the children: they corrupt them from their tenderest youth. Are you to put up with that? It is inconceivable! Rather that your children be poor—that they be removed from this apparent science that the world possesses—but that they be good children, Christian children, Catholic children, who love their holy religion, who love to pray, and who love to work; children who love the earth which the Good God has made.

Bert Perry writes:

I see two sides of modern products. There are some–like newer vehicles–that are just amazingly robust. There are also some things that are generally junk. Part of the difference is simply whether the customer has a long memory about the results of that purchase. For cars, everyone remembers if that 85 Olds was great or a piece of junk. Now, who remembers the manufacturer of their bedroom lamp? You will note that the quality problems with the latter are much bigger.

Along the same lines, goods sold to men have generally retained or improved quality–we do less shopping, but we remember whose products we bought as a result. Hence power tools are light years better than they used to be–at least at the middle and high range. Most men’s clothes are natural fiber–women’s clothes went mostly to synthetics a decade ago.

One other confounding issue is government regulation. For example, kitchen and laundry appliances last 7-10 years these days instead of the 30 that our grandmothers could count on simply because they’ve got to comply with “Energy Star” requirements–hence the robust components that tolerated a number of issues 50 years back are impossible today.

That same issue is why the automotive industry went through troubles in the seventies and eighties–CAFE regulations forced them to abandon proven technologies for new. The industry recovered, in part at least, as the new technologies were developed further and they got the bugs worked out. Remember the adage to never buy a car in its first model year? Same basic principle.

So in my view, it’s a mixed bag. If you’re willing to pay, you can get excellent products in most areas. If you look too closely at the price tag, watch out, because poor quality will bite you in the end.

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