Mostly agree and disagree. Kitchen and household appliance quality in particular suffered because many of the companies that make them are now brands owned by

Mostly agree and disagree. Kitchen and household appliance quality in particular suffered because many of the companies that make them are now brands owned by a small set of very large companies who outsource manufacturing that used to be done here. Examples: - GE sold off GE Appliances to Haier, a Chinese conglomerate. Their appliances used to be made in Louisville, KY; they now mostly do final assembly, with significantly fewer appliances being made there - most refrigerators are made by Whirlpool, Haier, or Electrolux. Everything except high-end refrigerators are made overseas. - many appliances are incorporating more complex electronics to "provide more value" in the form of mostly-gimmicky features at the expense of repairability and lower bills-of-materials (I.e. basically everything that Samsung and LG make). Think: oven ranges with touch screen controls that render the entire thing inoperative should the screen or digitizer go out, washing machines with smart features and touch screens that cease to work when they throw codes, etc. However, most of these decisions are being made to make things cheaper to satisfy what customers want. Most customers will buy a $400 4K 75" panel that will maybe last three years and track the ever-loving shit out of them and their viewing habits instead of spending $4k 75" panel that will last ten years or more because quality doesn't matter; they just want cheap TVs.