As an European consumer I became wary of US products. Very often you will find that what is delivered doesn't quite live up to what was advertised, sometimes it

As an European consumer I became wary of US products. Very often you will find that what is delivered doesn't quite live up to what was advertised, sometimes it is just the more expensive version of the exact same thing you would find on Aliexpress. Sometimes it is a bit like getting a McDonalds burger and comparing it to their product picture. And even if it is a genuine design I always wonder if customer satisfaction or the shareholder value is more important when push comes to shove. As I had expensive things that should last a lifetime fail only to find out that it was just a metal case around the same plastic crap you'd find in a product one magnitude cheaper. Not to say that this affects all areas, certain specialized equipment from the US is still top notch, e.g. SoundDevices with their audio recorders or similar equipment. Not to say that this isn't also a trend found in products from elsewhere. The way I see it "Made in $X" doesn't mean a lot anymore. E.g. it could mean that top engineers from $X designed a product that is manufactured with the tightest tolerances on the best machines in a way that it lasts forever, or it could mean that a underpaid engineer was pressed by beancounters to replace the last metal piece with a plastic one and it has been injection molded by a subcontractor that does that as a high-volume, low-margin filler job they only take to fill the gaps in their production schedule. Made in the US or Made in Germany doesn't mean anything at all, because bean counters extracted the value connected to that trust over the past decades. Now there is no trust left to extract.