It's not that stuff lasted forever, it's that things were repairable. That CRT could be repaired, or you could repair your truck. It sucked for sure but it was generally cheaper to repair something than to replace it. Then it became cheaper and easier to replace it than repair it because that one part cost more than buying a new whatever. Now the skills needed to repair things hasn't been passed down and is becoming a lost skill like many others. For the better, perhaps. What's good for the scorpion isn't for the frog one may say.