It's cheap to buy a new one for the features. It'd definitely be cheaper to buy a washer with 2010s construction and 1950s feature set, but that's not what cons

It's cheap to buy a new one for the features. It'd definitely be cheaper to buy a washer with 2010s construction and 1950s feature set, but that's not what consumers (or environmental regulators) want. Likewise, a modern washer with 1950s construction would be outrageously expensive, not to mention material and energy inefficient. (Keep in mind that the operating cost of an appliance is a significant fraction of its total cost) I'd also like to see a good data set of real prices of appliances over time. Edit: Here's some examples of 1950s appliances: http://www.thepeoplehistory.com/50selectrical.html http://www.thepeoplehistory.com/50selectrical.html Washer + Dryer in 1953: $494.90 Average monthly wage in 1953: $ 3,139.44 [0] Average monthly wage in 2013: $44,888.16 So a 1953 washer+dryer cost the same amount of labor as a $7076 washer+dryer today. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Average_Indexed_Monthly_Earnings https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Average_Indexed_Monthly_Earnin...