Overall quality definitely has gone down hill for the majority of consumer goods but then that's because of how mass production works. Everyone wants the latest and greatest and they assume they should be able to afford it. Well thanks to mass production they can, sort of. 50 inch TVs debuted at $25,000+. Today they are $900 or less and contain 10x the features of those first generation sets. But of course they have had to sacrifice in materials to get the price down, it's not JUST a matter of increased yields and demand, so yes quality suffers.

However interestingly as electronics shrink from one generation to the next they actually also become more efficient and use less power. Not only can they pack in twice as many transistors onto the same chip as last year, they run cooler and use less power. This actually means that some components like the microprocessors and other chips that do most of the work today will last LONGER. But other components don't follow quite the same set of rules and cost reductions there have been a result of manufacturing processes and new materials that might not last as long. So the screen itself and the speakers for example could very well not last as long.

I'd say on average what that guy told you is sort of true for cheap TV sets. They are designed to last as long as the warranty and maybe a bit more, after which they assume you are just going to get the next latest and greatest model. However expensive sets are usually still manufactured fairly well and will last you much longer. So as a general rule, they don't make TVs to last longer than 4 years, it's not true. He may have been saying that to get you to buy an extended warranty as well. Futureshop lives and dies by their extended warranties which is why I hate shopping there, they are trained to push those on you at all costs.

(yes FIFTY-plus) years old. My 57-y/o brother played in the box it came in! (he wasn't in school yet at the time). Although that one was still working (and still had the original light bulb inside!), they figured it might not last much longer, so they bought a second freezer as a back-up. That was eight years ago. The old one outlasted the new backup. Last fall they had to replace the backup; the old Zenith died two months ago.

A friend told me that the designers design the compressors on newer models to run twice as fast as on older ones, so they'll burn out much faster than older ones did. If they had continued building them like the old Zenith, everybody would have freezers that lasted virtually a lifetime, so they wouldn't be buying new ones, and that would cut into sales. Planned obsolescence, shorter product life cycles ==> more sales.

Our whole consumer industry is basses on upgrade upgrade upgrade. Have to get the latest and greatest. Last years model is not good enough. And what better way to force you to replace it than to make the life span shorter. However I still think price plays a roll and more expensive stuff usually is still relatively high in quality. Also like I was saying people want everything cheap now. We can offer it to them too, but it's just not going to last as long at WalMart prices.

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MiddleFingerMom: "Huh? Wha?"
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The minimal lifespan of new TVs was the same exact conversation I've had since my 15-year-old Panasonic just went out last week. I've been wondering for a few years when that day would come, and it finally did. As I was shopping for a replacement, this was the exact conversation I had with several salespeople and other customers as I was looking. The days of having a TV for 15 years are over. We were all commenting that we'd be lucky for them to last over 3 years. One salesman at Frys Electronics was pleased as punch that his Samsung has lasted for 5 years. That's why I just won't buy anything too expensive anymore. Just the minimum to get by with the most current inputs/outputs for the latest technology and that's it. It was fine with me not to have Blu-Ray until now.

Even DVDs -- we bought two on the same day at different stores (things on sale and such). One of the DVDs went out in about a year (I forgot which brand), but the Sony is still working. There was a time I would be upset that something so new would quit working, but with electronics anymore, I just have to accept it.

Locut0s, that's an excellent post about what's going on with electronics now. It explained a lot.