I've got a birds-eye view into one significant source of current consumer dissatisfaction: customer service.
I started in that field for a major corporation at the dawn of the phone expansion for customer inquiries and complaints (my company was the first to provide 800-line service nationwide on product packages).
By the time I left the field for a different assignment in the 1990s, most companies (including mine) were moving to phone trees to better manage call flow and volume and eventually, outsourcing the function entirely to regional and then international call centers.
Even I (maybe especially) find the experience of seeking help for problems today infuriating, exasperating, time sucking and whatever other negative adjective you want to apply. It's affected my shopping experience as well -- there's a reason I'll often choose Amazon over another vendor. They make it so damned easy to return things. There's something to be said for the seamless consumer experience.
I'm proud of my early career answering phone calls from consumers. I developed a deep knowledge of the company I worked for and their products because I needed to know how to respond, or who to go to when I didn't have an answer. Trying to reach someone today with that level of expertise is a lot harder today.
Re: Baumol's cost disease, which you mentioned in your opening piece. The cliché example is a string quartet. Vox's piece put it this way:
"In the 1960s, Baumol was trying to understand the economics of the arts, and he noticed something surprising: Musicians weren’t getting any more productive — playing a piece written for a string quartet took four musicians the same amount of time in 1965 as it did in 1865 — yet musicians in 1965 made a lot more money than musicians in 1865.
The explanation wasn’t too hard to figure out. Rising worker productivity in other sectors of the economy, like manufacturing, was pushing up wages. An arts institution that insisted on paying musicians 1860s wages in a 1960s economy would find their musicians were constantly quitting to take other jobs. So arts institutions — at least those that could afford it — had to raise their wages in order to attract and retain the best musicians."
Quality of life is what people want to retain as they age. They do not want to feel excluded from the benefits of advanced modern society. But densification situates the aged in competition for that quality. Densification means "more of everything" vexing and perplexing. Seniors gradually lose efficacy and energy and the will to fight for their quality of life. At age 40 one feels dominant: at age 50, one feels sovereign and flexible. But after age 60, there are intimations of doubt. But then come hints of the eclipse. Small, troubling, unwelcome. I've never met a senior who was indifferent to this transformation.
"Maybe "better" and "worse" are too rigid to define the complexity of life"
Ya think so? But "better" and "worse" are far easier than the blooming buzzing truth. I find that I cannot describe my life to any person in my family because there is just too damn much going on. That's why some of the greatest novels end up being more than 1000 pages long.
Another somewhat unrelated thought: we associate the past with life challenges met, we associate the future with life challenges we may or may not be able to meet. Past is job done— future is what the hell will the job be? It is never certain that the future will be better than the past and we can count on the certainty that there's going to be a lot more bizarre things we will need to adjust to.
One thing I've been happy about in the last 5 years is that Office 365 has gotten better at explaining new features. Trying to figure out new features used to be hell on Earth.
I just wish you had corrected my typo lol - your technology point makes a lot of sense, also reminds me of how we all thought the internet would be here forever but so much is disappearing (and there are now efforts to archive it).
It's a bit off topic but something my wife and I have found interesting is disposable cameras making a comeback for events. I understood why people would use instant polaroid cameras but am still confused on why people younger than me are opting to use a disposable camera (called single-use camera on amazon) at a music festival instead of just using their phone. The phone seems much easier to carry and takes better photos
An increased interest in the analog is the obvious answer. This has both aesthetic and ethical appeals. "Better photos" is subjective--do you want a clearer image? Or something with more texture and life? Film will provide the latter with much more ease than a digital image which you have to manipulate in Light Room or Photoshop to get the same results.
As an amateur of amateurs, the appeal of analog film for me is that I don't really have to learn any post-processing tools to get a cool image. I can just focus on subject and composition and let the film handle the back end (there are obviously things you can do in the development and scanning process, but it's more optional than with an iPhone or DSLR).
The added appeal, for me, would be to be able to take photos at a festival without viewing everything mediated by a digital screen. I could take photos, forget about them, and not be distracted by the thousand other things on my phone.
There's nostalgia here too--a generation of digital natives looking for some semblance of a slower, more tactile past.
I'm not sure how much is the film they get. I've talked to some people about this and they are marketed as something you can take with you for events; festivals, date nights, etc. So that you can take pictures of the whole thing spontaneously. Perhaps their is a focus on the spontaneity of it and the inability to change the shot or check if the picture was good. I've always been annoyed at the people who record the entire concert instead of enjoying the moment.
It is odd to me but I think there were similar things going on when millenials used polaroids to instantly capture moments. Disposable cameras were just not something I ever thought would return
OTOH, no one would ever trade a 1950s air conditioner for a model from 2024 (from an established brand). And personal computing has pretty much done nothing but get better.
Better for specialists, perhaps, but the ordinary user gets less benefit at significant cost. I have to do almost nothing on a PC that I couldn't have done 20 years ago, and most of the exceptions (such as video conferencing) I would gladly forego. Newer versions of windows are more stable, but a single botched software update can render a billion computers useless and I no longer own the software I pay to use.
A bicycle from the 90s or even the 70s won't help you win a pro race, but how many people riding to work or taking kids to the park benefit from hydraulic brakes and electronic shifting?
I agree that some things are less value for the money than they used to be, but your examples are looking at the wrong parts.
As someone who was getting a degree in Computer Science 20 years ago... I wouldn't go back. There was a lot more work involved to connect to the internet, it was slower, everything was outdated after a year and needed to be upgraded just to keep doing the same stuff. Buying a "cheap" PC in 2000 was a lot more expensive than buying one today. And of course, many people don't even need a PC at home now. Instead they use a smartphone or tablet (at least outside of work).
Same thing for bicycles. Casual bicyclists don't need hydraulic brakes and electronic shifting - but they might benefit from a lightweight frame (which is now cheap enough to have in a sub $300 bike, not just specialty bikes for racing) or the better engineering of today's panniers and trailers.
I understand where you're coming from, but I would argue that seeking a degree in computer science puts you in the specialist category. What counts as "keep doing the same stuff" or "outdated" for you would of course be more demanding.
Not all costs are reflected in the purchase price. The obverse of the nostalgia that people rightly criticize is a similar blindness to precisely those costs where technological developments are concerned.
Modern bike trailers are great and I wouldn't want a vintage one. I like then so much that I happily ignore where they are made and the labor conditions that produce then.
Modern panniers are lighter than the waxed canvas models of yesteryear, but won't last as long. That's a tradeoff, not a matter of better/worse.
Frame weight is one of many factors on a bike, and frequently given too much consideration in my opinion. Lightweight steel frames have been readily available for a long time. Modern alloy wheels would be a better example of something that's unambiguously improved, but again, where and how are they made?
The point isn't go back or not-those arguments are usually dishonest. Nor am I trying to establish the superiority of any technology over another. The point is to honestly consider all the advantages and costs of the things we use, not just our preferred ones. Modern people have tremendous and usually unexamined biases toward newer technologies. Thus, our discussions normally understate the costs of the New Thing and understate the advantages of what it wants to displace.
I've got a birds-eye view into one significant source of current consumer dissatisfaction: customer service.
I started in that field for a major corporation at the dawn of the phone expansion for customer inquiries and complaints (my company was the first to provide 800-line service nationwide on product packages).
By the time I left the field for a different assignment in the 1990s, most companies (including mine) were moving to phone trees to better manage call flow and volume and eventually, outsourcing the function entirely to regional and then international call centers.
Even I (maybe especially) find the experience of seeking help for problems today infuriating, exasperating, time sucking and whatever other negative adjective you want to apply. It's affected my shopping experience as well -- there's a reason I'll often choose Amazon over another vendor. They make it so damned easy to return things. There's something to be said for the seamless consumer experience.
I'm proud of my early career answering phone calls from consumers. I developed a deep knowledge of the company I worked for and their products because I needed to know how to respond, or who to go to when I didn't have an answer. Trying to reach someone today with that level of expertise is a lot harder today.
Re: Baumol's cost disease, which you mentioned in your opening piece. The cliché example is a string quartet. Vox's piece put it this way:
"In the 1960s, Baumol was trying to understand the economics of the arts, and he noticed something surprising: Musicians weren’t getting any more productive — playing a piece written for a string quartet took four musicians the same amount of time in 1965 as it did in 1865 — yet musicians in 1965 made a lot more money than musicians in 1865.
The explanation wasn’t too hard to figure out. Rising worker productivity in other sectors of the economy, like manufacturing, was pushing up wages. An arts institution that insisted on paying musicians 1860s wages in a 1960s economy would find their musicians were constantly quitting to take other jobs. So arts institutions — at least those that could afford it — had to raise their wages in order to attract and retain the best musicians."
https://www.vox.com/new-money/2017/5/4/15547364/baumol-cost-disease-explained
Quality of life is what people want to retain as they age. They do not want to feel excluded from the benefits of advanced modern society. But densification situates the aged in competition for that quality. Densification means "more of everything" vexing and perplexing. Seniors gradually lose efficacy and energy and the will to fight for their quality of life. At age 40 one feels dominant: at age 50, one feels sovereign and flexible. But after age 60, there are intimations of doubt. But then come hints of the eclipse. Small, troubling, unwelcome. I've never met a senior who was indifferent to this transformation.
"Maybe "better" and "worse" are too rigid to define the complexity of life"
Ya think so? But "better" and "worse" are far easier than the blooming buzzing truth. I find that I cannot describe my life to any person in my family because there is just too damn much going on. That's why some of the greatest novels end up being more than 1000 pages long.
Another somewhat unrelated thought: we associate the past with life challenges met, we associate the future with life challenges we may or may not be able to meet. Past is job done— future is what the hell will the job be? It is never certain that the future will be better than the past and we can count on the certainty that there's going to be a lot more bizarre things we will need to adjust to.
One thing I've been happy about in the last 5 years is that Office 365 has gotten better at explaining new features. Trying to figure out new features used to be hell on Earth.
I just wish you had corrected my typo lol - your technology point makes a lot of sense, also reminds me of how we all thought the internet would be here forever but so much is disappearing (and there are now efforts to archive it).
It's a bit off topic but something my wife and I have found interesting is disposable cameras making a comeback for events. I understood why people would use instant polaroid cameras but am still confused on why people younger than me are opting to use a disposable camera (called single-use camera on amazon) at a music festival instead of just using their phone. The phone seems much easier to carry and takes better photos
An increased interest in the analog is the obvious answer. This has both aesthetic and ethical appeals. "Better photos" is subjective--do you want a clearer image? Or something with more texture and life? Film will provide the latter with much more ease than a digital image which you have to manipulate in Light Room or Photoshop to get the same results.
As an amateur of amateurs, the appeal of analog film for me is that I don't really have to learn any post-processing tools to get a cool image. I can just focus on subject and composition and let the film handle the back end (there are obviously things you can do in the development and scanning process, but it's more optional than with an iPhone or DSLR).
The added appeal, for me, would be to be able to take photos at a festival without viewing everything mediated by a digital screen. I could take photos, forget about them, and not be distracted by the thousand other things on my phone.
There's nostalgia here too--a generation of digital natives looking for some semblance of a slower, more tactile past.
I'm not sure how much is the film they get. I've talked to some people about this and they are marketed as something you can take with you for events; festivals, date nights, etc. So that you can take pictures of the whole thing spontaneously. Perhaps their is a focus on the spontaneity of it and the inability to change the shot or check if the picture was good. I've always been annoyed at the people who record the entire concert instead of enjoying the moment.
It is odd to me but I think there were similar things going on when millenials used polaroids to instantly capture moments. Disposable cameras were just not something I ever thought would return
OTOH, no one would ever trade a 1950s air conditioner for a model from 2024 (from an established brand). And personal computing has pretty much done nothing but get better.
Better for specialists, perhaps, but the ordinary user gets less benefit at significant cost. I have to do almost nothing on a PC that I couldn't have done 20 years ago, and most of the exceptions (such as video conferencing) I would gladly forego. Newer versions of windows are more stable, but a single botched software update can render a billion computers useless and I no longer own the software I pay to use.
A bicycle from the 90s or even the 70s won't help you win a pro race, but how many people riding to work or taking kids to the park benefit from hydraulic brakes and electronic shifting?
I agree that some things are less value for the money than they used to be, but your examples are looking at the wrong parts.
As someone who was getting a degree in Computer Science 20 years ago... I wouldn't go back. There was a lot more work involved to connect to the internet, it was slower, everything was outdated after a year and needed to be upgraded just to keep doing the same stuff. Buying a "cheap" PC in 2000 was a lot more expensive than buying one today. And of course, many people don't even need a PC at home now. Instead they use a smartphone or tablet (at least outside of work).
Same thing for bicycles. Casual bicyclists don't need hydraulic brakes and electronic shifting - but they might benefit from a lightweight frame (which is now cheap enough to have in a sub $300 bike, not just specialty bikes for racing) or the better engineering of today's panniers and trailers.
I understand where you're coming from, but I would argue that seeking a degree in computer science puts you in the specialist category. What counts as "keep doing the same stuff" or "outdated" for you would of course be more demanding.
Not all costs are reflected in the purchase price. The obverse of the nostalgia that people rightly criticize is a similar blindness to precisely those costs where technological developments are concerned.
Modern bike trailers are great and I wouldn't want a vintage one. I like then so much that I happily ignore where they are made and the labor conditions that produce then.
Modern panniers are lighter than the waxed canvas models of yesteryear, but won't last as long. That's a tradeoff, not a matter of better/worse.
Frame weight is one of many factors on a bike, and frequently given too much consideration in my opinion. Lightweight steel frames have been readily available for a long time. Modern alloy wheels would be a better example of something that's unambiguously improved, but again, where and how are they made?
The point isn't go back or not-those arguments are usually dishonest. Nor am I trying to establish the superiority of any technology over another. The point is to honestly consider all the advantages and costs of the things we use, not just our preferred ones. Modern people have tremendous and usually unexamined biases toward newer technologies. Thus, our discussions normally understate the costs of the New Thing and understate the advantages of what it wants to displace.