Those seeking weak links in the economy of the United States arc prone to overlook what may be one of its most costly deficiencies. This deficiency, resulting from convictions based solely on sales goals, develops from the premise that products should be designed and fabricated to have built-in obsolescence.
Although this practice maybe too strongly entrenched in the emotional aura surrounding the soft-goods industry to be attacked successfully, it is not necessarily immune to remedy when considered with respect to certain products which have, or closely approach, the status of capital investments. Some evidence strongly indicates that many intricate and often unreliable "sales point" differences built into such items as domestic applicances are put there solely to achieve distinction from other similar devices and arc unnecessary, unneeded and result in a loss to the consumer. An equal amount of attention devoted to avoiding coupling of galvanically incompatible metals, to drilling...
