this post was submitted on 04 Jul 2024
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citing Rossmann?
I've got no idea who that is so no, I wasn't knowingly quoting them
he's involved in right to repair and has youtube channel where hem mostly talks about how brands try to avoid questions on repairability and sustainability
There's some appliance breakdown vids (idk if Rossman is one of them) but the gist is Samsung and LG like to put cheap plastic parts in high wear locations which inevitably fail.
Fridges are dead simple appliances. A compressor and evaporator coils with a temperature sensor. There's absolutely no reason they shouldn't outlast you and everyone you love.
It's insane these "premium" brands are built to fall like they do.
He's predominately Apple product repair guy, but he's also right to repair advocate.
And he likes to rant about brands that are generally against consumer rights (and common sense).
Real premium brands do last, but not everyone wants to pay 10k for a fridge
Premium brands are not industrial brands. Goal of premium brands is to be as expensive as possible.
That's the problem. A lot of those high-end, expensive appliances are built just as shitty as the low-end, basic models. The difference is just some bells and whistles and a higher price tag.
I have no problem paying extra for a higher quality, better built appliance. But the challenge is differentiating those from the low quality, built as cheaply as possible appliances that have just been marked up with a premium price tag.
At least when I buy the cheap, shitty model, I get what I paid for.
I often repeat to my parents and grand parents, that "expensive doesn't mean good quality". Well, mostly to mom and granny.
Bells and whistles that sell your personal data.
Sub Zero, Thermador... Looks industrial to you?
Checking what a fridge cost you in 1980 in an old Sears catalog, you'd be paying $4000 today accounting for inflation.
But people compare their reliability to 1000$ fridges today
America's stagnation issue
An insulated box with a decent compressor does not cost 10k. Making a compressor that fails after 2 years is actually hard to do, something both LG and Samsung spent time and money to achieve.
Consider, for example, that nearly every car manufactured with an AC. Which is exactly the same tech as a fridge. Yet you rarely end up needing to replace the compressor on your car. You might need to recharge it or clean it, but not replace the compressor. 10k of your car price isn't the HVAC.
Just saying, that's the price for premium brands like Sub Zero or Thermador, but they have their reputation and it's very very good
There are premium brands that do well, but there are also non premium brands that do pretty well. GE, for example, tends to make fairly reliable product (even today) for roughly the same price point of samsung/lg.
I mean, having to replace a fridge every few years because it constantly breaks in a way that’s uneconomical to repair will cost you a lot more in the long run.
That’s the thing, it’s more expensive being poor.
You’d be better off getting a 2nd hand quality brand from a wealthy suburb when they remodel their kitchen every 5ish years or so.
Sure it costs more in the long run, but the majority of people live paycheck to paycheck, do you think they want to go and pay 25k for a full set of appliances just so they'll save money over 30 years when they can barely afford to pay for their basic needs?
Even second hand, they're still way more expensive than the basic shit from economical brands...
Bit of a straw-man argument there: firstly you don’t need to spend that all in one hit; the break even point is a lot sooner than 30 years; and lastly, paying to replace cheap shot that breaks quickly with more shit that breaks quickly is one of the traps that keeps prone living paycheck to paycheck.
My two examples below:
Samsung dryer died after 3yrs, out of warranty, broke in our 20s, couldn’t afford to replace it. Lucked out finding an ANCIENT Miele condenser dryer on Marketplace for $50. Not only did that thing last us another 3 years before it started tripping the circuit breaker, it was cheaper to run than the old unit and ended up saving us enough money that we were then able to invest in a brand new Bosch unit that’s still going today (7+ years).
LG refrigerator died in a little over 3 years, due to a known compressor fault; uneconomical repair even though it was still under warranty, so we got a full manufacturer’s refund. We bit the bullet, did our research and went with a Made in Japan Hitachi model. It’s always outlasted the LG, and is again more energy efficient that we’re saving a few bucks a month on electricity.
I will reiterate; it’s expensive being poor. Buying a better quality second-hand unit rather than a new ‘commodity brand’ appliance is just one of the small ways to make things a little less expensive.
So "You live paycheck to paycheck? Just find cheap stuff until you decide to bite the bullet and get a loan to buy something that will last!"
78% of people in the USA live like that.
Getting loans for things is part of the reason why it’s expensive being poor.
The average US credit card charges ~22% interest and there are a crap-tonne of sub-prime loans that prey on desperate people that charge a hell of a lot more than that! A ‘cheap’ $500 dryer will end up costing close to double that by the time the loan ends up paid off.
This isn’t a ‘have you tried just not being poor?’ comment; I’ve been in a similar position for the entirety of my 20s and a good chunk of my 30s, before I learned that there was nothing wrong with going against consumer culture and buying an older, quality second hand product.
Becoming financially mature is probably the most painful part of becoming an adult, in multiple senses of the word.