None of that gets to the question of why a brake job specifically costs so much, which is why I used it as an example. Brakes are no harder to do than 3 decades

None of that gets to the question of why a brake job specifically costs so much, which is why I used it as an example. Brakes are no harder to do than 3 decades ago (at least for my car). They cost a lot because of the cost of labour, primarily. Other work has different costs. The primary basis of your argument falls flat for me though. You don't need to repair new cars as much as you did 40 years ago. You never need to mess with your carburetor, spark plugs last a decade+, other stuff tends not to fail at nearly the rate it used to. My current car has 11 years and 250000 km on it, and I can count on one hand the number of times I've had to do any service aside from oil changes. (aside: why would I ever want to adjust airbag timing? And yes, if I somehow need to replace an airbag, I'll happily pay someone certified to do it. And if I buy a secondhand car, I'd really like to know that the person before me couldn't change airbag timing or velocity) I do feel a sense of foreboding when it comes to choosing my next vehicle though. I want a BEV, but they all have so much electronic junk in that I fiind to be actively detrimental. I recently drove a friend's (2017) Toyota for a weekend, some ice built up on the sensor (in the badge on the front bumper). The following day, when roads were clear, it wouldn't let me use regular cruise control because the sensor was still iced over. A different toyota wouldn't let me cross the lane lines to avoid a pothole. They'll both slow me well below the speed limit on the highway based on the car ahead of me, with no notification. I would pay more for a car with these "features" removed.