Posted on 06/14/2008 12:15:52 PM PDT by Mike Acker
the plug on the left has been in common use for years. there is nothing wrong with it except we have lots and lots of them in bushel baskets. so some goon make the one on the right. not that it is better in any way: it isn't
this is done for one reason only and that is to force us customers to buy their part.
this is a PITA, as well as a waste of money and also bad for the environment as it is a waste of resources
generally I'm a free market guy but this? sheesh! we need UL to just tel these guys "forget it. use the existing design we ain't certifying a different cord to facilitate your greed
ya like this one? check the catalog for lawn mover blades ( tee hee )
society consists of three main elements: we the people, corporations and government
the government is supposed to reflect the collective will of the people . theorectically free market economics keeps corporate greed under control. but sometime it needs a little help. which is why we have anti-trust laws, epa, cafe, etc
government is supposed to be for the people. it can be, but to make it work requires the people to be educated, and to have communications and leadership
Then you go out, invest the capital necessary and produce toasters that cost $75 each. We'll see how many people share your views versus those that want low cost.
But you won't do that. Instead you'll sit around here and complain about corporations like a liberal.
No, you are thinking like a liberal ---- oh, I don't like this plug design so I want gov't to standardize all the plugs for me.
Can you point to the part of the Constitution where the gov't should regulate plug design?
sometimes government intervention is necessary. i prefer free market forces but in the past we have had to resort to government action especially in fighting monopolies
Government has done far more harm in its "do gooder" mentality than it has prevented.
With a power level able to deal with such dangerous enemies the government itself is dangerous. that is why government must be limited, and placed under the control of the people.
there will be those of course who will seek to seize control of government so that they can re-direct that power toward their own objects. this must be prevented; control of the government must remain in the hands of The People
The people can only control government through collective action and collective action requires education, communication, and leadership
right now We the People are in a bad spot: our education has been compromised as well as our leadership. Only recently via electronic technology have we regained communication capability; but this alone is only enough to "spread the alarm" -- it won't get anyone out of bed
when you acquire understanding you will realize that proper government is the friend of the people; misuse of the government by special interests is simply a manifestation of greed which, left un-checked, results in tyranny
For someone posting on a conservative forum, you seem to have a remarkable ignorance of how the free market works.
You claim that you would be happy to buy a toaster of the quality made in the 50s, despite it costing a proportionate $150 to $200 or more. Good for you! You are obviously a person of rare discernment, for whom quality is far more important than price.
Unfortunately for you, most people don’t feel this way. Therefore, those who produced lower quality but much lower price appliances took market share away from those producing the higher quality but more expensive units. The high quality producers had in the long run no choice but to compete on price by lowering their quality, or to go out of business, which would equally well result in no quality toasters being on the market.
There are quite a few things where people are willing to pay a much higher price for higher perceived quality: clothes, hotels, restaurant meals, wine and liquor, autos, ladies of the night.
There are a great many other things for which most people will pay little if any more for supposed quality, buying strictly on price: gasoline, airline travel, most groceries, etc. Among these are small household appliances. There just is little market for high quality and price. Therefore none (or very few) are produced. Since the market is small, there are few economies of scale for the producers, which drives the price per unit even higher.
The free market does not always provide the best product. It just provides the product that most people perceive as the best value for their money. Those who disagree on priorities are just out of luck.
IMHO, businessmen who produce a product for which there is no market are not ethical. They are stupid. And they aren’t in business for long.
Good news! I found a $350+ toaster for you at Neiman-Marcus. Hand-assembled in England. I have no idea whether the quality is as good as those made here in the 30s and 40s. But at least you can spend about as much.
.com/store/catalog/prod.jhtml?itemId=prod49270072&ecid=NMCIGoogleBaseFeed&ci_src=14110944&ci_sku=H2MM5
If you like, you can also spend upwards of $1000 on a commercial toaster, which will presumably last for decades in home use, as you prefer.
I have a simple counter example. When my Kenmore (Sears' house brand) dryer failed, I quickly discovered that the plastic idler pulley had cracked. I called Sears' appliance center with the model number and they told me, come on down, they had the part. I walked in, arrived at the counter and asked for an idler pulley, ready to recite the make and model. The guy behind the counter interrupted me and pointed me to a wall about 10 feet wide and six feet high with nothing but idler pulleys. All identical. Worked fine.
You can probably find after market parts for almost anything mass produced, including lawnmower blades. I actually bought an aftermarket lawn mower blade, that came with different bushings and adapters for various models. Worked fine.
Couple we know celebrated their 50th anniversary last year and they still had their original wedding present Sunbeam toaster, in shiny like-new condition, which, she claimed, had been used every day for fifty years.
Exactly. Someone will (or already has) come up with an adapter to join these two plugs, and all will be right with the world.
You haven’t been buying much in the way of high-end electronics lately, have you? Video game manufacturers are the worst - they make consoles, then they make their games so they only run on their consoles. You can only play Zelda on Nintendo consoles, Halo on Xbox’s (or PC, since it’s a Microsoft thing), or... well, not much for the PS3. But, now many popular games (The Sims, the EA Sports games, movie-based games, Guitar Hero, etc) are being made for all 3 platforms, because people are more likely to buy your game if they don’t have to buy another $300 console to play it. Then, of course, there’s the Apple vs. Microsoft thing going on - they used to make their software only compatible with their hardware - if you had a Mac and wanted to get office software, you’d have to buy Apple’s office suite. However, two things happened: Open-source appeared, so you didn’t have to buy anyone’s software, and companies started making their software compatible with competitors’ products (think MS Office for Mac, or Safari and iTunes for Windows).
In the end, I think that the benefit of making their products compatible with their competitors will outweigh the possible profit and equally possible losses from making their products compatible only with each other (and therefore losing money from having people not buy their products case it’s incompatible with the rest of the world).
Says who? Are you an electrical engineer? A design engineer? The manufacturer may disagree with you. I may disagree with you. Don't like it? Seriously - don't buy it. Your entire problem from start to finish to is completely solved.
this is done for one reason only and that is to force us customers to buy their part.
First, how do you know that? Seriously? And second, so what? Assuming it is absolutely true, how are they forcing you to buy anything? Really. Please answer how you are forced to buy anything?
I don't need the government to tell me which toaster to buy or why.
Maybe the Mickey Mouse plug has some design benefit over the old kind. Doubtful, but I don't need the government to decide that, either. The market does a lovely job of that, and no one holds a gun to your head to make you buy (or prevent you from buying) products on the market.
the government is supposed to reflect the collective will of the people . theorectically free market economics keeps corporate greed under control. but sometime it needs a little help. which is why we have anti-trust laws, epa, cafe, etc
I was unaware until last week (when John McCain announced it) that it was the job of government to determine that businesses were being "greedy" and that government has an obligation to reign in these filthy capitalist pigs forcing us to buy their wares.
Is there any evidence that this is unsafe? None that you've offered - you simply don't like it.
I was unaware until today, when you announced it, that the job of government is to save us from having to read Consumer Reports before we buy a toaster.
All these years, I've thought it was my job and responsibility to spend my money as I saw fit. Now I see that it's the government's job to tell me how to spend it and what I can buy. What a moron I've been.
Thanks for the head's up.
Not true! I bought a Sanyo from Japan several years ago. Heavy enameled metal casing, a nice thick glass door (a bit hard to explain, but it's a toaster/toaster oven combo), stainless steel trays & racks, etc. It makes perfect toast, perfect bagels, and it is very easy to clean. It has seen heavy use and is still in perfect shape. It was not cheap, but I cook a lot, and that made it worthwhile. It is modeled on ones used in Japan.
My neighbor has a KitchenAid Pro, which is excellent, too(also expensive - around $225 dollars).
Very high quality small appliances do exist, but they can be quite expensive and may not be worth it if you don't subject them to heavy use.
Still, they are not as much as a toaster was in the 1940s/50's in today's dollars and you get so many cool new features.
The US system of innovation coupled with ever-lowering costs for better products and more product choices is second to none.
Turns out people collect these things.
Wikipedia:
Significant ultramodern chrome designs were the Sunbeam T-9 “Half-Round” or “World’s Fair” toaster, designed by George Scharfenberg and introduced in 1939, and the General Electric 139T81, produced in quantity from 1946.[5] Automatic electric toasters were very much a luxury item, with the better models costing up to $25 in 1939 (approximately $360 in 2006 dollars). Most toasters produced from the late 1930s through 1960 are generally considered to be of the highest standard in workmanship and material quality; many were built well enough to last for decades. Due to their aesthetic popularity, some of the classic toaster designs from the 1940s and 1950s are now being reintroduced into the market, though these reproductions for the most part are not constructed to the high standard of the original designs.
I think Globalism is a form of socialism based in a business model first piloted in the transition of Hong Kong from a western capitalist system to a pseudo-capitalist system.
In the orient, one of the chief methods of gamesmanship is to turn the 'weight' of one's opponent against him, and that is what I think is happening to western business. Business has always been susceptible to greed in an open market, but was limited in the past by principles.
The 'free trade' of today removes those nasty, nasty conservative principles which once limited business to it's proper role. The system is now based upon greed and literally anything goes. As with anything founded in the fallibility of Man, this system can only lead to doom.
government is supposed to be for the people. it can be, but to make it work requires the people to be educated, and to have communications and leadership
I disagree that the people are the problem. the people have always been without great knowledge, as a whole. The problem results from a lack of principle in the leadership. the people follow, as they always have.
Having been successful in production coatings on a regional basis, I am hardly what you consider me to be. My company was consulted by industry leaders for our ability to quickly produce coated building materials for shipping- something we were doing long before any other.
No, I sit around here complaining like a conservative, wishing to preserve and restore that which American business used to be.
Your statement is true to a point- I object to the supposition that "most people don't feel that way". Most people are ignorant in their purchasing, looking for good quality and fair price, and relying on names and products that are well known toward that end.
A good example is the Chicago Pneumatic 734 1/2" Impact wrench- Long a mainstay in mechanic's tool boxes... Some time in the '80's CP produced a knockoff of their old 734, called it the 734 and sold it in the $35-$50 dollar range. The true 734 was then called the 734b (or some such) instead.
Many, many people were sucked into that ploy, and were screwed by the time they found out, as the new 734 lasted only long enough to make it past it's warranty, and just a bit further.
Another great example, the Milwaukee Hole Hawg, was altered by replacing it's brass worm gear with nylon. The early model is sought after for it's indestructible nature. The new ones are crap.
Both of these examples, and thousands more, rely on a good brand and product to fool the buyer. The tools are virtually identical to their true counterparts as far as the eye can see and the hand can heft.
The free market does not always provide the best product. It just provides the product that most people perceive as the best value for their money. Those who disagree on priorities are just out of luck.
This is the business equivalent of 'relative morality', and it is just as damaging. The obvious and predictable end is also the same: As relative morality results in the basest level of morality, the eventual (here now) end of relative quality is the poorest sort possible.
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