The Green Party has a Member's Bill up arguing for a consumer right of repair; Auckland University's Alex Sims has written a few columns in support of such a thing.
I'd had an email asking about that legislation; figured I'd share my response here - tidied up a bit.
If it’s more expensive to produce a product that can be easily disassembled for repair, there will be trade-offs. Consumers could choose an offering with lower up-front costs, but hard to repair, or one with higher up-front costs, but easier to repair. There’s no reason for legislation to privilege one choice over another.
If one car company makes vehicles that can only really be repaired by dealers, and another uses a more open standard, the latter could easily advertise that ease of repairability. I remember back on our farm we had a very strong preference for tractors made by Versatile, because field-repair was dead simple and you didn’t have to wait for a couple days for some tech to come out with a diagnostic kit in the middle of harvest. Folks who could afford fleets of John Deere tractors to cover twenty square miles of fields could have a couple in reserve; we couldn’t on 1000 acres. Trade-offs and consumer choice. The John Deere machines were great for folks in situations different from ours.
But even leaving that aside, New Zealand has to be a regulation-taker in this space. We import all this stuff. A bespoke rule could require separate production lines for products destined for the NZ market. That has to increase costs while sharply limiting the range of products here available. And if Europe or some other crazy kind of place sets rules requiring more repairable versions, nothing stops anyone from bringing the Euro-standard products into New Zealand.
Also important to remember that avoiding putting things in landfill can itself be wasteful. Landfills charge people for dumping things. Important to make sure that user charges there are set to fully cover the cost of disposing of stuff in landfill. If the landfill charges are set properly, and it's cheaper to buy something new and dispose of the old one than it is to repair the old one, repairing the thing would be wasteful. It would take more real resources to effect the repair.
And if there are competition issues around vertical integration in repair, that’s for ComCom right?
I hope the legislation does not progress. It could easily see a sharp reduction in the range of products offered onto the NZ market.
The current Consumer Guarantees Act amounts to an information requirement on this stuff.
If a manufacturer does not undertake to provide parts or repair services, they inform the consumer. That's the exception provided at Section 42 and signaled in Section 12. It arguably increases consumer information and enables better-informed choices. I'd still argue that manufacturers of easily-repaired goods already have plenty of incentive to advertise that fact to customers, but it's harder to see that the Act does harm where that exception is provided.
Deleting that exception while extending the requirements placed on manufacturers willing to sell into the NZ market really wouldn't be good.
Dr Eric Crampton is Chief Economist at the New Zealand Initiative. This article was first published HERE
If one car company makes vehicles that can only really be repaired by dealers, and another uses a more open standard, the latter could easily advertise that ease of repairability. I remember back on our farm we had a very strong preference for tractors made by Versatile, because field-repair was dead simple and you didn’t have to wait for a couple days for some tech to come out with a diagnostic kit in the middle of harvest. Folks who could afford fleets of John Deere tractors to cover twenty square miles of fields could have a couple in reserve; we couldn’t on 1000 acres. Trade-offs and consumer choice. The John Deere machines were great for folks in situations different from ours.
But even leaving that aside, New Zealand has to be a regulation-taker in this space. We import all this stuff. A bespoke rule could require separate production lines for products destined for the NZ market. That has to increase costs while sharply limiting the range of products here available. And if Europe or some other crazy kind of place sets rules requiring more repairable versions, nothing stops anyone from bringing the Euro-standard products into New Zealand.
Also important to remember that avoiding putting things in landfill can itself be wasteful. Landfills charge people for dumping things. Important to make sure that user charges there are set to fully cover the cost of disposing of stuff in landfill. If the landfill charges are set properly, and it's cheaper to buy something new and dispose of the old one than it is to repair the old one, repairing the thing would be wasteful. It would take more real resources to effect the repair.
And if there are competition issues around vertical integration in repair, that’s for ComCom right?
I hope the legislation does not progress. It could easily see a sharp reduction in the range of products offered onto the NZ market.
The current Consumer Guarantees Act amounts to an information requirement on this stuff.
If a manufacturer does not undertake to provide parts or repair services, they inform the consumer. That's the exception provided at Section 42 and signaled in Section 12. It arguably increases consumer information and enables better-informed choices. I'd still argue that manufacturers of easily-repaired goods already have plenty of incentive to advertise that fact to customers, but it's harder to see that the Act does harm where that exception is provided.
Deleting that exception while extending the requirements placed on manufacturers willing to sell into the NZ market really wouldn't be good.
Dr Eric Crampton is Chief Economist at the New Zealand Initiative. This article was first published HERE
6 comments:
I could write a very large document explaining why for the vast majority of consumer products, it makes no eco or economic sense to even attempt a repair.
Basically the most sensible thing would be for the councils to do an eco collection every six months or so, and put the whole lot through a shredder, and recover the metal components.
fixing stuff has been overtaken by labour costs - a car mechanic is charged out at over $100/hr - a small job will cost $1000, anything major is for the wreckers or more likely a deceptive sale on TradeMe
Fixing stuff is for nostalgia TV shows - its been overtaken by labour costs.
A car mechanic in a small garage is billed at over $100/hr so even the simplest job with parts will be over $1k. A car WOF is $90 for just inspection and paperwork.
I vote YES for choice. If you want to beat your chest about your Green credentials, then be my guest, but don't impose your self-imposed limited options on me.
I've been repairing stuff all my life, buying used stuff, and I'm not afraid to get my hands dirty and chase up spare parts or do a #8 wire fix, but most people just don't have the skills or time, and have to pay $100/hr "professionals" to do the fixing.
Some stuff I buy because I know I can fix it and its high quality is worth the extra $, other stuff I buy because its cheaper to replace it when it falls apart. As a side line,I build high quality custom furniture that will last 100+ years. How big do you think my customer base is? Pretty close to zero. Most people buy on price, especially these days.
Anon 11:31 - I buy things by weight - is it substantial enough to do it's job ?
The lighter it is generally means that corners have been cut until it just works.
In the past RCA would design a radio or TV etc, to the highest quality, then remove components until it stopped working, and then put that last component back in.
All the corners had been cut.
That was the design they used for the production runs.
Exactly the same applies today for all consumer devices.
I believe that our generation is the last that is capable of diagnosing a problem , and then applying a kiwi #8 wire solution.
The whole extensive chain of things that need to happen to commercially repair relatively low value goods is too expensive to be practical.
Not even the most dedicated Greenie should contemplate strapping his TV to his handle bars and biking it across town to a repair shop, have a techie spend time at $100+ per hour diagnosing the fault. spending more expensive time finding spare parts, order them, wait for them to air freighted into NZ , time spent fitting part etc etc etc.
Just recycle it as electronic waste !
Both in terms of NZ wages and relative price of same item decades ago, the price in NZ of most manufactured goods is incredibly low, and in the case of items from Asia often to an extent which is morally disturbing. A typical example is electric pedestal fans; about the same price as mid 1960s but wages up near 50 times. At typical repair charge rate of $100 an hour the new cost is dissipated in 1/2 hour. A small family car without radio or heater was a tradesman's wage for a year. Recently a Suzuki Swift was about 1/3 of such a wage.
Making repairable also leads to warranty problems and rorts where owners have damaged tinkering with, fitted dud parts etc.
But when and if the World ever takes climate change seriously we will have to divorce ourselves from consumerism (and full employment) and from the cultural motivation to keep up with and preferably exceed the Jones'. Cars are just one item for which life could be hugely prolonged if gratuitous complexity were shunned and standardised parts made available for decades.The recently reported simple fixable old Corolla with 2 million km rpresents a huge saving in CO2 production..But air bags, non standard and expensive computer control unit now force premature replacements with all the vast associated CO2 generation.
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