Comment by ddalex
I agree that repairing is vastly preferable - I grew up in a poor communist country, where repairing and self-resourcesfullness was the norm.
However it's not the consumerist mentality driven by increased buying power - it's sheer economic sense - the time and effort is way better spent, economically speaking - by simply replacing. It's the lower price of goods that drive this thing.
My fridge broke the other week. I called the repairman who quoted a repair bill that was 10% MORE EXPENSIVE then buying a new fridge. Simply the time of the repair shop and the transportation from home to shop and back was more expensive them just buying a new fridge, chucking out the older one, and calling it a day.
My grandparents, nah, my parents would be horrified by throwing up a "nearly" good fridge. To me, it makes economic sense.
This is often due to the total costs being externalised (pushed off to others) and therefore not reflecting the true cost of the replacement nor the costs of (safe) disposal of the old unit.
Externalised costs such as emissions from manufacturing of new raw materials (metals, plastics, gases, etc.), transportation, disposal, and more.
Obviously it depends on what exactly fails. I've kept 'white goods' going for over 20 years despite:
I think sometimes repair-or-replace depends on one's state of mind. Figuring out what is wrong and how to fix can be frustrating but, equally, it can be extremely satisfying to realise you can do it and are no longer reliant on some mystical "expert" !Society as a whole in many countries is losing (or has already lost) the ability to be self-reliant and that lack makes people and communities generally more fragile.
Self-reliance is one of the drivers of hackers and tinkerers.