(not that we know where to repair it or how much it’d cost, we just throw it)
Edit : I can understand why taking two hours to repair something worth 20€ isn’t worth it though, e.g. a computer mouse, but even in such case we could standardize a minimum and have enterprises specialized in ensuring that spare parts are always available(, each costing a few euros).
Then instead of the longer task of repairing a circuit board, the consumer could easily swap it by h·er·im·self, or leave it to a pro who’d take less than 5mns.
(And the older circuit board would be sent for free and either repaired or stripped for parts)
(Transportation costs will be greatly reduced in the very near future with automation, but warehouses should exist less than 12h away)
This is how we got to become a society of “disposable” culture.
In Europe they introduced a “Right to repair” law, that force manufacturers ensure spare parts for at least 10 years and provide repair service at a reasonable price.
That’s a great measure that should incentivice companies to make products more repairabld!
Why would that be the case in the future? It was in the past, when people used to maintain whatever they made/bought and use it until it was completely unusable, because they were too poor to buy a new one
Industry and automation made production way more cost efficient, but didn’t do the same for repairing, probably because it’s not as predictable and automatable as making stuff from scratch
You can repair a lot of stuff, but you usually have to pay more than the price of buying a new item
Industry and automation made production way more cost efficient
It should still be cheaper to build a new part(, and change that part,) than a new whole(, and buy that whole).
And i.d.k. if it’s the only reason for the low prices : it’s cheaper for westerners to buy from non-westerners(, including mines or actions), and conversely.
Repairing is done locally(, otherwise the transport would take too long), and ends up being more expensive than buying new products made externally.
Our productivity may be higher[1], even if we’re deindustrialized, but their minimum wage is way less than ours.
[1] : I.m.o., even more obviously when considering that we’re in the finance sector, we may reverse things when saying that a high productivity explains the difference in living standards : it’s the difference in living standards and GDP that inflates the productivity.
Since productivity∝GDP, then countries with a high GDP will have a high productivity.
And a country that increased its GDP(, e.g. through increasing its minimum wage perhaps,) would hence increase its productivity. Just an uninformed thought on my part, i.d.k. honestly.If i keep the example of the computer mouse, it couldn’t cost 20€ if it was produced locally, if only because it takes much more than 2 cumulated hours to build one, at a minimum wage of 10€/h.
Conversely though, it’d mean that it’d be very expensive for a non-westerner to buy products made in the west, which is the case, but we can still manage to sell them because we have a monopoly on new technologies(, with e.g. Japan or South Korea, but then again their minimum wage is high as well so it’s the same remark), such as planes or softwares.Just look at houses or cars (which are designed for repairability) and you’ll see that building new is almost always easier and cheaper (although that doesn’t mean it’s never worth it to repair).
A good example is any electrical or plumbing work in a house. You need to identify the issue, access the problem area, fix the problem, then patch the area back up. This is why repair and maintenance is such a huge part of home ownership.
Sadly as things become more complex and minituraized the ability to repair them also becomes more difficult. You can sometimes cannabilize multiple pieces of electronics to create a functional one, but it’s almost impossible to repair a motherboard/circuitboard for a tv/laptop/electronic. And that’s not even getting into plastics, which are almost impossible to work with after they’ve been finalized for a product.
I have opened and tried to fix all my things. Including multiple cheap mouses. Although I have not always been successful, I mostly see it as an experience, and as a learning moment. It’s broken anyway, so it could only get better. Quite often I’m able to improve on it too! (add USB C charging to a mouse)
Will it though?
That would be ideal, but is not the reality right now, and several things would have to change in order to get there.
As a person that repairs everything I own as a hobby (I would love it to be my job but sadly it pays much less), I can tell confidently the following:
The reason why repairing things nowadays tend to cost equal or more is due to manufacturers actively making products harder to repair.
Soldered parts instead of connectors, glued chassis, glass parts that are imposible to remove without breaking, spare parts that are hard to find, or outright impossible due to being proprietary, and a long list of etc…
Furthermore, manufacturers factor in unit turnover for subsidising unit prices.
Ex. They’d rather charge you 300 for a TV that will last 4 years than 500 than one that will last 10.
Why? Simple math and “Maximising shareholder value”.
300/4 = 75 500/10 = 50
You dont know it but everything you own is a subscription service provided by the manufacturing companies.
This is aggravated by a never ending chain of improvements, new models, new trends that keep you in the loop of consumption.
Why would I try to repair my 3 years old phone when I can buy this new shiny one?
They are getting richer by the minute while the rest of us is digging an early grave for ourselves, by polluting the world and consuming non renewable materials at a insane speed.
Not everything is bad though.
In Europe they introduced a “Right to repair” law, that force manufacturers ensure spare parts for at least 10 years and provide repair service at a reasonable price.
That’s a great measure that should incentivice companies to make products more repairabld!
manufacturers actively making products harder to repair.
Possible counterexample: My dishwasher. The drain pump is super easy to replace – unplug it, disconnect the hoses, and pop it off the little metal piece that supports its weight. It takes longer to bail out the water in the pan and wiggle it out from under the counter than it does to replace the faulty pump.
(At the same time, it’s a pretty crap model. We’ve had to replace that drain pump 3 times since 2019)
Granted some appliances are harder to replace and due to that are expected to last longer.
No the case for smaller ones that are full of plastic parts that are imposible to source replacements for.
I think 3D printing will help a lot with that.
True. Dishwasher is one thing, but IDK that I’d be able to swap out any parts on my coffee maker or immersion blender.
I will repair something if it’s swapping out a part and considering if what I’m repairing is overall worth repairing. Something’s just aren’t worth disassembling and attempting to fix and now lots of things are built in ways that cause them to break even further if you tried to disassemble it. A lot of things are glued together or have fragile clips that break.
Being handy isn’t hard, you just have to try and then go buy a new one if you can’t fix it. The worst parts are getting the tools, buying is fun but expensive, and then if people find out that you can fix it then they will start asking for favors.
It would have been unbelievable in the past as well. What we are experiencing right now shouldn’t be considered normal. Quality and efficiency have no longer being incentivized by the forces of the market for quite a while. If we don’t fix that, there won’t be a future for us to be baffled by this in.
it’ll either be Star Trek (“repair? just put it in the matter reclamator and replicate a new one!”)
or Mad Max (“of course you repair! wait, what’s a ‘new thing’?”)
I think the opposite is going to be true. One thing I noticed when I moved recently is that’s it’s getting cheaper to throw out perfectly good stuff and then buy it again rather than paying to have it shipped long distance too.
Wow
It also reminds me that it was apparently cheaper to destroy most of the military equipment when leaving Afghanistan than rapatriating it.
Only if we level the global payscale, living conditions, and economy. Otherwise, as long as wealthy nations have vastly more disposable income than poorer nations, they will continue to be exploited. The cost of labor to commercially repair something in the EU or North America is typically higher than the cost to have someone build a new product in India or China, ship it there, warehouse it, and ship it to your door.
I fix things. I always have. I tinker everywhere. It’s not profitable. I can only do it for myself or for friends and family for free. If overall functionality is already lost, I always try to figure it out. I saved a nice gaming monitor from a friend’s trash by finding the capacitor on the main power port hadn’t seated right before soldering, so it was temperamental. Took 2 disassemblies and 3 hours to find and fix, but has now been running for 6 years flawlessly. When it malfunctioned, it had NO life at all, which likely narrowed it down to between the power socket and the main board. I bet your local labor price on ~2 hours plus risk/profit fee is comparable a new low end monitor.
I do lots of automotive repair for myself. It’s annoying as shit in forums to see people complain “there’s no good mechanics anymore, they’re all parts replacers now” and in the next reply say “just buy a new brake drum/rotor because it costs the same to have yours turned (refinished)”. As if the “parts replacers” can do the refinishing for free. They’re mad about the inflation/exploitation combo but taking it out on some other person suffering the same market imbalance.
There is a reason all the cool hack and repair videos now largely come out of Asia. It’s not just sheer population numbers, they’re activities that largely don’t happen in NA/Eur anymore.
If that’s the case, it probably means you just get to “own” products as a subscription; which collectively covers supposed “refurbished” product replacements when they break.
