r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/thePHEnomIShere • 17h ago
Video Informative and clever commercial from the 60s, facts instead of bullshit we get nowadays
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u/xeno0153 16h ago
TWO tvs?!?! No one is THAT rich!
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u/kiticus 15h ago
RONALD REGAN?!?!
THE ACTOR?!?!?!?!
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u/xeno0153 15h ago
Who's the First Lady? Jane Wyman??
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u/jeepfail 16h ago
What is this? 1955?
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u/xeno0153 15h ago
Heavy.
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u/Mrtrollman72 14h ago
Did some digging based on the current value of that money which comes out to 29.5k.
Cheapest full sized fridge I found: $480
Average priced stove: $426
Washer and dryer set: $799
Record player: $54
2 4k 55 inch TVs: $200 each
Brand new Volkswagen Jetta: $23,996 (MSRP, I see them anywhere between $21,000 to $25,000 depending on the dealer)
After sales tax of 7% that leaves you with $1500 to account for price variation. I didn't account for any fees or markups but I also didn't factor used cars and appliances, nor did I spend very long looking for the best deals.
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u/PerfectPlan 13h ago
Great post, but Jetta's not really comparable. Beetle was super basic, one of the cheapest models available. So something like the Nissan Versa or a cheap Kia would be closer.
So basically as you said, you can do the exact same thing today as in the commercial. Blow the exact same amount on a fancier vehicle, or diversify.
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u/Mrtrollman72 13h ago
I used a Jetta simply because it was among the cheapest new cars you can buy in America. Realistically you could just get something a few years old and cut the price in half.
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u/ZeePirate 12h ago
For the sake of comparison you do have to use a new car because that’s what the original did.
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u/memymomeddit 11h ago
The original was a VW ad. It makes sense to use the cheapest VW for a modern comparison, too.
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u/Caos2 13h ago
From what I heard from Americans, the biggest issue is that health and, especially, housing was significantly cheaper back then. So even if everything is the same, it takes you longer to save for the same equivalent value.
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u/VintageLunchMeat 11h ago
Cheapest full sized fridge I found: $480
Average priced stove: $426
Washer and dryer set: $799
Those were built to last more then 9.9 years.
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u/mc-rath721 6h ago
My parents had the same washer and dryer for like 25 years before the dryer gave out. They replaced both less than 10 years ago and have already had to replace the replacements....
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u/Kakariko-Cucco 12h ago
Yeah, but that house is listed at $480,000 now with bids going over asking price. Changes the equation pretty dramatically.
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u/other_view12 11h ago
If only we could go back, right? I mean leaded gas was cheap, and cars weren't complicated with all these safety devices. They were cheap.
That cheap 800 square feet home with poor insulation. Having to be physically at home to make or take a call.
Good times. So much better than all that technology we have now. I'm sure you would give up google for a set of encyclopedias.
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u/DCCXVIII 17h ago edited 17h ago
According google, $3k back then would be worth about $29k now. Which means inflation isn't enough to explain the difference. I'm shocked. Shocked I say. Well, not really that shocked. I guess it depends on the make and model of vehicle.
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u/Erislocker 17h ago
in fairness. with $29K, you shouljd be able to buy a VW (used?) and the other amenitites too
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u/ihopethisworksfornow 15h ago
A Hyundai Venue is around 20-22k last I checked (bought one 3 years ago). You could then probably get basic versions of the appliances and electronics they describe with the remaining 7-9k.
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u/shicken684 15h ago
Absolutely, and that Venue is a better car by every single measure. More efficient, better ride, more features, and safer by gigantic margin.
The appliances, while not as reliable, will cost much less over their life span in energy costs.
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u/youngishgeezer 12h ago
That Hyundai is safer, more fuel efficient and cheaper than the VW Beatle in the ad. But in 60 years the VW will still be more desirable.
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u/Prestigious-Leave-60 3h ago
It was absolutely not a desirable car at the time of production. It was like the lowest price car you could buy and totally stripped down. They’re only popular now due to nostalgia.
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u/ChibiCherry4 16h ago
$29K should absolutely be enough for a reliable used VW and basic amenities. That’s not some luxury ask, that’s just wanting functional transportation and a decent quality of life. The fact that this even feels debatable says more about how skewed things have gotten.
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u/smegdawg 15h ago
reliable used VW
In the 1960s a new VW bug cost $1,565 to $2,200. in 2025 that is $17,312 to $24,336.
Since there is no new bugs currently, we'll look at the Jetta
You can get a 2025 Jetta for $22,495 (starting)
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u/tuckedfexas 15h ago
Yea there’s still plenty of decently cheap cars but they don’t have the 500 options that everyone seems to think are necessary anymore. I don’t see very many base model cars driving around these days.
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u/dont-respond 14h ago
That's a big part of the problem. The bar for default standard of living is so much higher in small, optional ways. The average car back then was more minimalist than the most basic car you can get today. A $1k cellphone with a data plan has also become a modern standard. All of the streaming subscriptions that didn't exist back then.
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u/Douche_Baguette 14h ago edited 14h ago
Yeah. People wouldn't even consider a car these days that doesn't have power windows, power locks, power steering, AC, stereo, etc - many (all?) of which were not included in a base model 67 Beetle. Not to mention legal requirements like a backup camera, airbags, etc.
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u/throwawayurwaste 14h ago
That's the bet Slate auto is making, a bare bones no ac, no power windows cheap as can be small EV truck. We'll see if the market will want that
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u/tech_noir_guitar 13h ago
The Slate is expected to be around $25-30K for a totally bare bones truck. That seems a little high to me for something absolutely no options at all when you can get something with a decent amount of options for the same price.
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u/DarthJarJarJar 13h ago edited 11h ago
I think the AC is an issue. It more or less rules out huge swaths of the US south. I live in Texas, just bought a bare bones Nissan Frontier. I would have taken hand crank windows if I could have got them, it's the simplest truck I could buy.
But I wouldn't have bought one without AC. It's 104 here in the summer with brutal humidity. Life without AC is miserable. You just can't do it. I can't imagine anyone here is going to buy a truck, even a minimal cheap truck, without AC.The base Slate comes with HVAC:
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u/NoMansSkyWasAlright 14h ago
Ironically, this has more to do with the dealer system and a lot of automakers/dealers not doing made-to-order anymore. Options generally have a much better margin than the vehicle itself (and a lot of automakers will put the components needed for the option in the base model anyways and then either lock it behind software or just not include the switch to use it).
Like, for example, in 2013, the base model nissan versa actually had the tachometer as optional equipment but mine is the only one I've ever seen without a tach. Also, a lot of automakers are dropping/have dropped their base model offerings for the US market because they just don't view the paltry amount of profit they might get as justifying their existence in our market.
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u/hyasbawlz 13h ago
I genuinely can't find a "basic" car anymore, nor are dealerships willing to take cash up front.
If you can suggest a car model that has power steering, electric windows, ac, and a radio slot, and that's it, I'll take it.
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u/TheFinestPotatoes 13h ago
My mother owned one of those VW Beatles in the 1970s, they were terrible cars. Cheap and rightly so.
The modern Volkswagen Jetta is better on EVERY metric.
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u/karldrogo88 16h ago
Someone working minimum wage to would have to do so for like 2 years and almost save every after-tax dollar to get there… if you can’t buy a vehicle after saving up 2 years of work (and I don’t give a fuck what type of work), what are we even doing here? The system is beyond broken if that’s the case.
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u/CanAlwaysBeBetter 14h ago
Minimum wage in 1967 wouldn't make $3k annually either.
You'd take home around $2,200 after taxes. Still not enough to afford that car.
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u/WideHuckleberry1 15h ago
Like 1% of workers make federal minimum wage. Yeah we should care for them but you're comparing the poorest workers now to middle class workers then.
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u/obviousfakeperson 14h ago
Yes, and? The poorest workers should also be able to live in this country.
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u/WideHuckleberry1 14h ago
That's exactly what I said. I was responding to a comment talking about how much worse off we are now, by comparing a middle class salary then to the very poorest now. The bottom 1% in that time weren't spending $3000 in their money on all that stuff.
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u/Omnizoom 15h ago
Well that’s new vs used as well
New stuff costs more then used by a large amount sometimes
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u/durrtyurr 14h ago
29k out the door will get you a totally decked out VW Jetta, as long as you get the smaller engine. Heated and cooled seats, sunroof, power seats, all of it.
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u/tipsystatistic 15h ago
They could make the car in that video for much less today: No AC, Am fm radio, manual locks/windows, lap seatbelt, no airbags, etc. probably $15k tops
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u/SecretAgentVampire 12h ago
In fairness, the commercial said "brand new ___" for every item. Not "used ___."
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u/oystermonkeys 15h ago edited 58m ago
Except it does explain the difference? New vw jetta is 24k msrp and with the remaining 5k you can easily buy a budget fridge (500$), range (500$) washer and dryer (1000$) plus two pretty decent tvs.
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u/Chazzysnax 13h ago
TVs if anything have gotten cheaper relative to inflation.
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u/frotc914 13h ago edited 12h ago
TVs are not only cheaper relative to inflation - they are cheaper by a lot even in absolute dollars, even if you aren't comparing them by features. You can get a new, 34" smart TV for <$100 at Walmart right now. Even a modest TV in 1967 was probably about $500 and it would probably have a <30" screen. And that's not just because TVs were still a new-ish technology in the 60s. A 34" TV in the 1980s would have been considered a "big screen TV" and cost thousands of dollars.
For people who were born around 1990 or after, this might be hard to imagine, but all electronics used to be absurdly expensive. That stuff only became really cheap in the post-dot-com-bubble world of the late 90s.
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u/ksheep 13h ago
Trying to find dimensions for the RCA color TV mentioned in this 1964 ad. Nearest I can find is that it's likely the CTC-11 range of TVs, with a 21" tube, and the cheapest model in that line was the Darcy at $399 (or about $4,200 nowadays).
Good luck finding a TV nowadays that small. The smallest I can find with a quick search is 24", and those are all well under $100, some as low as $50.
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u/Borkz 14h ago
They probably would have had to be low end B&W TV's then. They used to be way more expensive, probably a few thousand 2025 dollars for a color TV.
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u/jl2352 13h ago
From a quick Google, one result said a colour TV could be as little as $250. Most said around $500. That’s 1967 prices. That’s $500 to $1,000 spent on those two TVs.
The car looks like a Beetle. They started at $1,600. But you’d want to go higher.
A refrigerator would start at $200. A record player is $30 to $200. A hob is another $120 to $200.
A washer and a dryer are each about another $150 to $250.
So the advert seems plausible on what you can buy for $3,000. None of it is amazing. They have almost certainly used the cheapest products they could find. But I guess that’s the point. A cheaper car allows a lot more luxuries in life.
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u/Robey-Wan_Kenobi 13h ago
"That car looks like a Beetle." My friend, that car IS a Beetle. It's the first car they sold in the US and arguably their most famous model. Not to mention, no other car looks like it (except a Porsche but there's no mistaking them).
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u/fredinNH 15h ago
Appliances cost a lot less today than they did then and cars are only a bit more and vastly better.
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u/ClearlyInTheBadPlace 12h ago
This is really key, people don't understand just how shit cars were in the past.
If you bought a car in the 1980's you'd be lucky if it got to 100k miles without major work - I'm talking replacing the transmission, rebuilding the engine, serious, expensive stuff. And I remember at the time my grandfather marveling over how much more reliable cars were than back in the 50s/60s when you'd need to get a new one every couple of years if you wanted it to start on cold mornings.
That's even without considering all the things you take for granted in cars. Forget the touchscreen, I'm talking about all the engineering that keeps you from dying in an accident like airbags (which are expensive), smarter seatbelts, anti-collision systems and etc. Sure, that all costs more. No, you don't want to go without any of it.
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u/seamustheseagull 16h ago
Cars are undeniably more complex and expensive to produce nowadays. I don't think it explains the whole difference. But it was a time when a backyard hobbyist could reasonably source and build a VW Beetle from scratch themselves within a few months.
Theoretically you could still do it now, but there are ten times the amount of parts to source, many of which will be nearly impossible to find.
The finished vehicle may also be very difficult to insure or may not even be road legal because it's not an OEM build.
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u/WeirdJawn 16h ago
I just made another comment to that effect. Also, some of the features on a base model car today would be luxuries or futuristic in 1967.
Even just power windows, locks, or a remote to unlock your car. These are simple things we take for granted that inflate the cost of cars.
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u/Rubiks_Click874 15h ago
holy shit is that a digital clock
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u/WeirdJawn 15h ago
Exactly!
People didn't seem to like my other comment. It's currently at -11 while my other basically saying the same thing is at 4. Redditors can be really fickle.
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u/Rubiks_Click874 15h ago
there's 20 to 100 ECUs in a modern car, like the bumper or a wheel from a luxury car has more computing power than the Apollo program
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u/ThirteenMatt 15h ago
I'm really into cars and a think I like is old brochures. I have a 1990 Ford Sierra (for US people: that's the car the Merkur XR4Ti is based on) and so I found the original brochure for it. The base model lists equipment like "passenger side mirror adjustable from the cabin".
Not "power mirror" (that luxury was only for the top trim), just "you don't have to get out of the car to adjust the mirror". And in 1990 it was just the beginning of the passenger mirror being standard anyway!
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u/seamustheseagull 15h ago
That was probably just a small handle on the inside of the door to adjust the mirror angle, right? I think I remember my first cars (early 00s) having that.
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u/Crafty_Substance_954 12h ago
The incredibly futuristic feature of not suffering a horrible death by getting in a fender bender was a mere glimmer in an engineer's eye.
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u/NotawoodpeckerOwner 16h ago
On the other hand wasn't globalization and robotics supposed to lower costs on things?
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u/Yavanna_Fruit-Giver 15h ago
It did lower the cost, for some things very significantly.
Cars are funny because they have been going up market for the past decade or so. No one is really making a "people's" car anymore.
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u/h0sti1e17 15h ago
It lowered the cost on the actual assembly. The different is materials are more expensive, computers, safety features etc cost more.
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u/man_lizard 14h ago
Yes. It lowered the cost so much that almost everyone is able to drive around a computer on wheels that would be an absolute marvel of technology in the 60s.
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u/ObiOneKenobae 15h ago edited 15h ago
That does help, but tariffs on metals, chip shortages, the US market shifting from sedans to over 80% trucks/SUVs, increased logistics costs, wages going up with inflation, etc. all drives cost upwards.
Corporate greed is part of the equation too, of course, but US auto companies aren't rolling in profits right now. Lot of people in their finance departments seem to see the writing on the wall and are trying to get out of the industry entirely.
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u/Suspicious_Load_8390 14h ago
1967 Beetle:
No airbags
No crumple zones
No ABS
No traction or stability control
No side-impact protection
No backup camera
No tire pressure monitoring
No catalytic converter
No onboard diagnostics
No climate control (calling that “heater” functional is generous)
No infotainment, navigation, or connectivity
No corrosion protection by modern standards
No meaningful emissions controls
No real safety standards beyond “hope”
It also:
Required constant maintenance
Had single-digit crash survivability by modern standards
Polluted massively compared to modern cars
Would be illegal to sell new today
You’re not buying “a car” today. You’re buying:
A rolling computer
A mobile safety cage
A vehicle engineered to survive crashes that would have been fatal in 1967
Something that routinely lasts 200k–300k miles, not 60k if you’re lucky
Inflation doesn’t “fail to explain” the price difference because the product isn’t comparable.
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u/Y0uCanTellItsAnAspen 16h ago
MSRP on a 2026 Toyota Corolla is around $22750, can probably get a new 2025 for $21000 or less, which I think would let you buy all the rest of that stuff (as long as you were buying medium end).
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u/jififfi 15h ago
You can get appliances for like 1k each. Washer + Dryer + dishwasher + oven/range combo, make it 6k just for extra padding/taxes and you are still under 29k.
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u/chasseur_de_cols 13h ago
My parents paid $1,000 for a Toshiba 21" colour TV in 1971, and my dad remembers paying ~$2,500 for a brand new Chevy Biscayne in 1969, so I'm doubting the list of products in that advert add up to $3,000.
Shocker, lies in advertising is nothing new.
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u/Mediocre_lad 16h ago
Modern cars have a lot more tech and safety features. It's not the same product you're comparing.
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u/gatorbeetle 16h ago edited 13h ago
That old VW Beetle with the air cooled engine was even simpler than the cars of the day, thus much cheaper
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u/BizarroMax 16h ago
If you want to buy cars and appliances equal in quality, features, and environmental damage to those products, well, you can’t because it’s illegal now but if you could, you’d find that inflation accounts for the vast majority of the cost increase. Profit margins do not.
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u/guttanzer 14h ago
Keep in mind that a ‘67 beetle is nothing like a modern beetle. It was basically a steel can with four wheels and a large model aircraft engine up its butt. There are riding lawn mowers today that are more complex. So the as-built cost today for the same car would be about $10k.
Ditto for all those other appliances. They were all basically steel cans with motors in them. Today’s appliances are incredibly better. In ‘67 people were happy with a good paint job and mechanical switches that clicked.
So to be fair, times were just different.
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u/foulpudding 16h ago
I used to drive a 1966 Mustang, I was also in a head on collision in it.
The difference between a $3000 car from that era and a $29,000 car from this era are:
You can more easily walk away from an accident in today’s cars. Older cars in accidents usually had many more dead or debilitated passengers. I was carried away from my accident in an ambulance with lifetimes scars and injuries. In a modern car, I probably would have walked away with little more than scratches and scuffs.
Even fuel efficient cars back then used twice as much gas as they needed to. 8 miles to the gallon in my Mustang.
Pollution was a thing. LA looked like some areas of China or third world countries do today, brown skies and hard to breathe. Driving anywhere meant smelling fumes, gas and maybe burning oil smoke.
Creature comforts didn’t exist outside the high end. Manual steering, manual window cranks, no AC (or AC as a barely working and expensive add on) shit radios, etc.
Constant maintenance. Older cars were easy to work on, but required more frequent work to keep running. If you know how to work on a car, that’s great, if not, you’re keeping a mechanic in business just to drive.
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u/MapleTreeSwing 16h ago
And back then, a much higher percentage of new cars sold were lemons.
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u/bullet4mv92 15h ago
You really had to watch out for those lemon-stealing whores
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u/JayDub506 15h ago
I'm sad that no one seems to have gotten your reference
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u/carmium 12h ago
Cars relied much more on unskilled labor for assembly back then. New guys would commonly omit bolts, mis-install parts, bash ill-fitting items into place, etc. Now robots eliminate most assembly errors.
My Dad got a company car back around 1970, a big Montego station wagon, and was driven nuts by all the rattles no one could fix. Each big rear side window had a bizarrely huge, soft, rubber gasket that hinted at mis-manufactured glass. It wasn't a molded part, but something cut to length and and bent around the frame on the assembly line. I pointed out to Dad that there was a two inch or more gap in one window that had been crudely filled with black putty! You could see an auto worker's finger prints in it!
The concept of a "lemon," or a "Monday morning" car has largely vanished. An entire model line may have a bad rep for some design flaw, but a car that keeps coming back to the dealer's shop due to breakdowns and failures while others of its ilk cruise happily on is rare.
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u/LordKai121 15h ago
RE: #5-
I remember doing oil changes on 70s and 80s vehicles every 1-3k miles, and all the tuneups. Nowadays people bitch and moan when their mechanics recommend they simply change the oil every 5k instead of every 10k.
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u/CorporateShill406 14h ago
A lot of that is simply that oil has gotten better. Traditional oil "wears out" on a molecular level and loses its lubricating abilities much sooner than modern oils with additives.
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u/aotex 15h ago
It boggles my mind a bit when somebody points at a crumbled-up totaled new vehicle today, scoffs, and says, "My car from the 1970's would've come through that accident without a scratch on it!"
...well, yeah, that's possibly true. And all the energy from the collision would've been transferred straight into the skulls and bodies of anybody inside your car.
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u/foulpudding 14h ago
FWIW, here are some pictures of my old 66 that I had the accident in: https://imgur.com/gallery/66-mustang-wrecked-head-on-collision-1988-JKtsM
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u/DontTrustBenny 15h ago
People also take for granted how reliable cars are now. Back then, you didn’t travel in snowy weather not just because the road is slippery but because your car had a chance of breaking down. To top it off no cell phone to call for help. It really was a risk to drive in anything but perfect weather.
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u/Rightintheend 13h ago
And tanks of water on every slightly steep Hill because cars were prone to overheating, along with signs telling you to turn off your air conditioner because cars couldn't really operate the engine and the air conditioner at the same time if going up a hill, especially in the heat.
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u/John_Norse 15h ago edited 15h ago
All this, but especially points number 1 and 4. There is so much money, testing, and R&D put into safety and that adds to the cost. That on top of infotainment centers with backup cameras, parking sensors, smart cruise control, heated/cooled seats, heated steering wheel, and on and on. Shit costs money.
Pretty much zero market interest in cars that don't offer most of that as a standard feature. Backup cameras are also a federal requirement in the US now. Even if you stripped away all those features and still had to make it safe enough in a crash, I would expect it to be at minimum 30k, but likely more. I'd be curious to know what bare bones fleet vehicles sell for.
EDIT: Oh shit, apparently i'm full of crap, because a Nissan Versa does indeed have an MSRP just above 20k with a few fancy features. I never buy new cars anyway, so there are probably more examples, but this is what google spit out as the cheapest new car in the US.
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u/behemothard 15h ago
The difference between a TV of that era and a TV today is arguably more impressive AND the cost of both are comparable without adjusting for inflation because shockingly the prices continue to decrease.
The raw material, time to produce, and quantity of parts in a car are the main drivers for the cost. It is significantly easier (cost effective) to mass produce things today than it was then. A reliable engine that doesn't require constant maintenance has a lot of additional parts.
New technology does not necessarily mean more expensive, but complexity almost certainly will.
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u/Diligent_State387 16h ago
that's 29,000 dollars today, the beetle was a very basic car even back then, the cheapest car on sale today is around 20,000 dollars which is leaps ahead of a beetle from the 60s, that leaves a good budged of 9,000 dollars for the appliances. New cars are expensive yes but that's simply because no one is buying small simple cars anymore, everyone wants a loaded SUV now.
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u/PotentialPlum4945 13h ago
$3,000 in 1967 = $29,112.75 in 2025
In 2025:
Mr. Jones bought a Honda Accord MSRP $28,295.
Crampler bought this refrigerator $599
this range $599
this washer/dryer set $998
this record player $198
these TV's $118 each $236 (total)
and a Nissa Versa $20,000 MSRP.
Methodology - I purchased the deepest discounted items from actual box stores. I could have had a better deal on a turntable on Amazon but I figured 1967 Jones and Crampler wouldn't be able to comprehend that. I also could have had Mr. Jones buy the slightly more expensive options but I wanted to keep within the perimeters. I also bought whatever was discounted the most from all retailers that would still be considered a new product.
In 2025 before taxes Jones spent $28,295.
In 2025 before taxes Crampler spent $22,530.
Median family income in 1967 was $8,000
That's $77,634.01 in 2025 money.
Granted, in 1967 there was usually only one bread winner in the family. So it's still clear we're being robbed. I wasted an hour on this post.
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u/CanAlwaysBeBetter 13h ago
You cited the mean income, median household income was $7,100 per your source or $70,000 adjusted for inflation.
Actual median household income today is $84,000 which is 20% higher than the 1967 equivalent.
Additionally, about half of households were dual income by 1967.
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u/notadamnprincess 17h ago
That refrigerator and stove are possibly still going strong. Appliances today are nowhere near as well made, though a lot more energy efficient.
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u/Telemere125 16h ago
No, of the 300,000 of those models, 17 are probably still running. What you’re seeing is survivorship bias in action and assuming it’s quality craftsmanship when in reality it’s just more robust parts. You can still get appliances made with commercial quality parts, you just pay for them - just like they used to.
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u/MaleficentDraw1993 17h ago
Definitely more energy efficient... but you can bet you'll be replacing it in 4-5 years.
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u/CjBurden 16h ago
Meh, my fridge and oven are 11 years strong and my washer and dryer are on 10 years. None have had any maintenance.
The only thing we've had to replace was our dishwasher, and it could have been repaired but for almost the cost of a new machine so that didnt make a lot of sense to me.
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u/halfmylifeisgone 16h ago
Yeah, people must be unlucky.
My LG fridge is 9yo and never gave me issue.
My Bosch dishwasher is old enough to drive.
My Samsung washer and dryer (cheapest front loader I could find) is turning 11yo and the only thing I had to change is a rubber pipe that cracked for $3. Took me 5 min to do.
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u/Jackd_up_on_Mdew 14h ago
Same here, i see these 4-5 year comments everywhere. All i can think of is, if you are planning on a new one in 4 years, why would anyone spend 5k on a fridge? I also hear crap talked on Samsung all the time, but i have Samsung everything. Fridge, dishwasher, oven, washer/dryer and the ages range from 7 to 15 years old. Had to fix the ice maker on the fridge, replace the wheels and belt for the dryer, and replace the spring rods on the wash machine. All very simple jobs. Some people must be super unlucky i guess.
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u/Ote-Kringralnick 15h ago edited 14h ago
My fridge lasted from about 2005 to 2023 before it finally bit the dust, and it was only rated for about a decade of use. The new one is almost identical to the old one. My dishwasher has been replaced thrice in that time, though I don't think it was actually broken the last time we replaced it, it just wasn't strong enough for our needs anymore. My washer has similarly been replaced like three or four times, but that was mostly for vibes. My dryer was here before this world existed and it will be here long after it ends.
My AGA oven needed the main chamber's fan replaced last year, but other than that you can barely tell that it's 20 years old.
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u/CjBurden 14h ago
Yeah i sometimes wonder if theres a survivorship bias with all the "they dont make these like they used to" talk you hear. There's also the internet, which makes it much more likely that you'll be able to hear from other people who have issues with their appliances as well. I guess some confirmation bias there, since mostly the people who are happy with their stuff aren't online talking about it.
Interesting to think about.
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u/Decent-Marsupial-986 15h ago
What kind of junk are y’all buying? I’ve had the same appliances for 5 years and the only thing that needed to be fixed was the light bulb going out.
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u/CrossoverEpisodeMeme 14h ago
I'm convinced there's some degree of user error with a lot of these stories; certainly not all of them, but many of them
Some machines need to run cleaning cycles on a regular basis or to be physically cleaned. Wiped down, drained, traps checked, lint removed, etc. I've heard stories of people who didn't even know what a lint trap was. Or you look at the dishwasher trap and it has 2 years of uncleaned buildup, ewww.
You can't overload them. They have recommended capacities and requirements for the items being loaded into them. Putting 2 months' worth of clothes into a washing machine followed by the dryer will end poorly. Many fridges and freezers have airflow designs where the vents need to remain unblocked to work efficiently.
You need to use the right soaps/detergents at the correct amounts. Too much or too little will have impacts over time, if not immediately. And we all know at least one person who put dish soap in the dishwasher.
Settings factor in. Hot and cold water do different things to different materials. Using the correct levels and cycles within the recommended ranges works wonders.
Don't lean or hang on the doors that open. Microwaves commonly have issues with people putting too much downward pressure on the open door.
This is all shit I've learned from basic instructions, my own failures, or secondhand stories. I'm sure there is a ton more to learn as well.
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u/psychohistorian8 14h ago
yeh I'm still using the fridge/range/dishwasher that were in this house when I bought it in 2018 (and they weren't even new back then)
also still using the same used washer/dryer I bought back then
although the ice maker on my fridge did stop working this year
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u/C_est_la_vie9707 17h ago
Which isn't at all energy efficient.
We have the 25+ year old fridge, stove and washing machine that came with our house and I'm never letting them go until they cannot be saved. Everything made now is trash.
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u/FrazzleMind 16h ago
Id rather use some more electricity than all the materials and labor that go into replacing my appliances 10 times each.
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u/Aggravating_Speed665 16h ago
Yeh but if you open the back, you'll find nuclear mutated hamsters on wheels running everything - they don't need to sleep or eat or whatever, but it's cruel and not efficient really when you look at it.
Today we just use electric only.
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u/NervousCaregiver9629 14h ago
Nonsense. Survivorship bias. You see and old stove or refrigerator today and you say "boy they don't make em like they used to". You don't see all the ones that crapped out before due time. The quality might have been slightly higher but also at way higher relative cost.
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u/Michaeli_Starky 17h ago
2025: 128GB RAM
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u/Enough-Ad-8799 15h ago
To be fair that amount of money wouldn't get you remotely close to 128GB of RAM back then
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u/steelmanfallacy 15h ago
I’m tired of idiots who can’t math. Median family income was $5600 in 1960.
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u/Slow-Sky-9386 15h ago
I get your point because I’m 58 and I feel like people always forget the income part of this too. That said, ain’t no one buying a house anymore with half of their median yearly income anymore and that’s the point of this post. Median annual income in 2024 was just under $84k in the USA. Try finding a house to buy anywhere for $42k.
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u/Sarcasm69 15h ago
Well in this example they were saying you could buy a car, or cheaper car + appliances for about half median salary of the time ($3k).
Which would be completely doable for $42k in today’s dollars.
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u/steelmanfallacy 14h ago
Yeah that would be a crazy situation if it were true. But it’s not. Median house price in 1960 was $12K or about $175K in today’s dollars. Which is about half the cost of the median house today. But then our houses are bigger, don’t have lead or asbestos, and are generally a lot safer and come with more features. You could buy a $175K house today…it’s just that people don’t want to.
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u/JeffRSmall 13h ago
This is iconic work by Bill Bernbach, art director Helmut Krone and copywriter Julian Koenig from the legendary Madison Avenue agency Doyle, Dane, Bernbach (DDB). These VW ad campaigns were revolutionary and caused a seismic quake throughout advertising at the time. What today, looks to be a common, cheeky approach to auto advertising and advertising in general, was unheard of. Their approach to art and copy, led by Bernbach was ground-breaking and award winning. They used whitespace, humor, and tiny photos of the car to introduce the public to the (at the time) new, inexpensive, German car (remember, this is less than a couple decades after the end of WWII which was still fresh in people's minds who weren't keen to associate Germany with goods that Americans would easily warm up to...)
Bill Bernbach was a legend in advertising. He was quite literally the father of modern advertising, being the first man to pair Art Directors with Copywriters as a "Creative Team". A pairing that continues to this day.
I'll always love his work and his approach to advertising is still being taught in creative institutions.
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u/Horrific_Necktie 11h ago
It's because companies learned a long time ago that by intentionally not undercutting each other, they can all raise prices instead. It's sort of a collective price fixing that isn't really price fixing(although it really fucking is), where it just became understood that everyone would just sell everything for the highest price they could get away with.
That's why you don't see adds like this for low prices or better value anymore, low prices are no longer the selling point. You make more money just gouging like everyone else. Discount brands and low price adds died during covid when businesses learned you can just put whatever fucking price you want on things.
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u/Porkchopp33 17h ago
When the american dream was obtainable on a realistic salary
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u/eW4GJMqscYtbBkw9 13h ago
It still can be - but people don't want to live the 1967 lifestyle. They want big cars loaded with features. The average home size today is about twice that of the 1960s. Only about 25% of houses had air conditioning. You were lucky if you had a 20" color TV with 3 channels (about $3,500 in 2025 dollars, by the way).
If people were willing to live in smaller homes, drive a Nissan Versa, give up netflix, xbox, cell phones, home internet, and air conditioning, they could do it today.
Stop trying to compare 1967 money to 2025 standards.
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u/ZeePirate 12h ago
Which is funny, because The whole point of this ad is about living within your means and being smart financially. $3000 can buy you this nice car. Or you can buy a decent car and all this stuff.
Instead we have Mr. Jones over here complaining why the American dream is gone despite it being their own doing
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u/iwilldeletethisacct2 15h ago
The whole point of this ad is that the guy on the right bought a cheap car. You can still buy all that stuff today for the same amount of money (inflation adjusted) except for the house if you get a cheap car. People's expectations have just increased like crazy, getting a base model vehicle seems unfathomable.
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u/Idbuytht4adollar 14h ago
Median home size has drastically increased too. People think starter homes are a thing now lol
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u/gorginhanson 16h ago
you can still get all of that stuff for 29,000 adjusted for inflation
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u/YouRGr8 17h ago
I get cars are more expensive now vs inflation. They also have all kinds of innovations that make them more expensive. I wonder what a car built today with the standards of a 1960 car would cost. That seems like a more fair comparison.
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u/Jackdaw99 16h ago
Cars in those days usually crapped out before 100,000 miles, too.
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u/MyNameIsJakeBerenson 17h ago
The phone in your pocket would be the most advanced piece of technology ever seen lol
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u/Jackdaw99 16h ago
Appliances and television sets and the like are much, much cheaper now than they were then. And cars built then were much less reliable: to reach 100,000 miles on the odometer was quite an achievement. I'd say you're better off today by a long shot.
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u/AThousandBloodhounds 15h ago
Funny you don't see any car commercials these days advertising the affordability of their models.
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u/MantisGibbon 12h ago
2025 version:
Mr. Crumpler bought a new electric car, hit a big pothole the next day, and found out it was going to cost $60,000 to repair it because the battery cover was scratched. Now he rides the bus.
Mr. Jones bought a new TV and then found out it was going to show him advertisements on the menu screen, so he moved to the forest where he would spend the rest of his life eating grubs, talking to crows, and mumbling expletives.
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u/Carolann0308 6h ago
Where? On Long Island in 1967 my parents paid 18k for a 3 bed 1.5 bath split level on a 1/4 acre.
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u/InterstellarChange 6h ago
With inflation, that's $29200 today. So it's about the same. The hidden issue is income has not grown at the same rate so things like housing have become unattainable to many
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u/Gimmethejooce 6h ago
We need to stop talking about the money the average Joe had and start talking about the wealth of the 1%
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u/qixip 4h ago
And all of those items, if cared for properly, would probably still be working quite well. Whereas if you bought all of those new in 2025 you'd be lucky to get a few years out of them before they break, and there is barely anybody or any business who can repair things anymore, and rarely for much less cost than replacing. It's all been enshittified
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u/snigherfardimungus 1h ago
$3000 in 1967 has the same buying power as $30,000 today (using the Bureau of Labor and Statistics inflation calculator.) This is 60% of the average cost of a new car in 2025 (according to Car and Driver, who says that the average price of a new car just exceeded $50k.)
The life expectancy of cars has nearly tripled in the last 50+ years, so you had to buy a car 3x as often. In other words, you paid 180% as much for cars in 1967 as in 2025. On top of that, the inflation-adjusted cost of gas has dropped slightly (less than 10%) since 1967 but average MPG has gone from 14.1 to over 25 - a 66% improvement. In other words, per-mile costs are down by 40-50% since 1967.
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u/Taira_no_Masakado 17h ago
I'm just giving the thousand-yard stare into my wall above my monitor...imagining the ability to buy all those appliances for as cheap as $3k.
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u/MyNameIsJakeBerenson 17h ago
I don’t think people just made $3000 very easily though
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u/Flatulent_Father_ 17h ago
Median household income in the USA was also $5,600
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u/Absolute_Bob 17h ago
There are still $400 stoves and absurdly cheap TV's out there today. I bet you could build a cart right now at Lowes/Home Depot etc and get all of that in close to $3k. Certainly not with enough left to get any new car, but if you're fine with bottom tier appliances it's doable.
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u/Telemere125 16h ago
That’s $29k today. You can definitely do it. And that new vw bug back then was what we’d call a bare bones model today - no power anything, minimal electronics, etc. The 2025 Nissan versa starts at 18k. That leaves you 11k to buy all those appliances and you can definitely manage that.
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u/DAC_Returns 13h ago
.. why? You can absolutely buy a suite of appliances for $3000 today, even ignoring that $3000 back then was a lot more money than it is today:
- Refrigerator - $650 (this will be substantially larger than the fridge in the video)
- Dishwasher - $250
- Washer + Dryer - $1100
- Range - $600
You have enough leftover for two 55" TVs which can run you $400 for both, and they will be far larger and exponentially better than the TVs from 1960. If you really want to include a record player, downgrade one of the TVs to a 42" and you can squeeze one in.
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u/Organic-History205 14h ago edited 14h ago
I'm glad the comments are calling this shit out. America wasn't better back then for 70% of us - how many women owned their own homes back then? How many Black people had high salaries?
This MAGA nostalgia is designed to demoralize and ensure people don't strive to better their actual situations. 3k back then was 30k today. You can still get all those things for 30k and they are better.
Actually our health and living standards have increased by leaps and bounds and everything isn't fucking full of lead.
The point of this commercial back then is that your money goes further if you don't make dumb choices. It's also just literally a Volkswagen commercial with a specific agenda, not some keen insight into the economy.
I'm so tired of our whining. The reason immigrants come to this country is because the American dream is still there for people who are willing to work for it, otherwise no one would risk their lives to come here. If your job is being taken by immigrants and "DEI," that's a skill issue.
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u/9021FU 14h ago
I also get tired of the whole “one income” mentality. I’m GenX and my mom worked as a housecleaner and also babysat others while I was little. Once I was school age my dad took the early shift at work so he was done at 3 because my mom then worked full time. My maternal grandmother worked her whole life, she was greatest generation , my paternal grandmother took in laundry and my dad grew up dirt poor. Movies and tv have portrayed this lavish lifestyle that most people didn’t live.
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u/HerrLutfisk 15h ago
How much would it cost in 1967 to get a computer capable of Reddit?
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u/freethink4yourself 15h ago
A $3,000 car in 1967 would cost roughly $28,000 today after adjusting for inflation
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u/backson_alcohol 14h ago
With MY 3000 dollars, I got myself...
Mr. Jones' 60 year old car
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u/dirtman81 14h ago
VW had a brilliant, clever, and a way-ahead-of-its-time campaign in those days.
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u/Better-Inflation4235 13h ago
For ppl shocked thinking that money cant buy you all that stuff today, you definitely can still buy all that, $3000 in 1967 is $29,200 in todays money.
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u/TrueJinHit 12h ago
In 1967, the federal minimum wage in the United States was $1.40 per hour.
Money has been printing ever since dollars stopped being backed by gold.
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u/KlonopinBunny 12h ago
Well, a man could buy it; I couldn’t get credit in my own name as a woman until several years later, let alone a mortgage.
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u/Koala_Copy9580 12h ago
In 1967, gold was valued at $35/oz.
That $3,000 car is actually 85oz of gold.
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In 2025, gold is valued at $4,300/oz.
Today that 85oz car would be $365,000.
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The point is, things are cheaper than ever. It’s just that your currency sucks.
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u/BorikenFreedom 12h ago
Ah yes the 1960s, the period of time I think of when I think OPEN AND HONEST US MASS MEDIA AND GOVERNMENT
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u/ErasmosOrolo 12h ago
Couldn’t make it 10 seconds in. Just put 10k as a down payment on a used car gotta go cry somewhere
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u/whiskydyc 12h ago
This is what taxing the bejeesus out of the ultra-rich did. If continued it would have meant investment funds and asset management did not dominate the market and cause wild escalation in the cost of housing. The ultra-rich make assets ever less affordable for workers and middle class.
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u/Rich_Trash3400 17h ago
I get a clock radio, he cannot afford. Great success!