25 Things People Say Have Gotten Worse Despite Getting More Expensive
I can accept that things cost more now. I don’t enjoy it, but I understand the general concept. What I’m having trouble with is paying more for something that also got worse. At least give me one side of the transaction to feel good about.
That’s the frustration running through these responses.
People shared what they think has gone downhill, and plenty of them are still taking our money. Some of these takes are debatable, but a lot of them have probably crossed your mind at some point. Cough, cough, Airbnb.
1. “Tickets. I’m taking my family of six to see Disney on Ice. Tickets were $49 each. Not terrible.”
“For six tickets, the cost would be around $300. But with the Ticketmaster fees (and taxes), it came out to $609. More than freaking double.”
— phillyindc
2. “Fast food. It’s expensive and so blah now.”
“One of my favorite taco fast-food places was pretty good when I was a kid. It was like Chipotle and Panda Express in that the employees were on an assembly line and you could watch them make your food. When I was in high school in the early ’90s, they changed the model, and the food took a huge nosedive. At least it was still cheap then; now it’s ridiculous. The menu was much smaller before it changed, too.”
3. “Clothes. I get fashion changes, but the quality is awful now.”
“Fast fashion has destroyed the longevity of clothing. My parents have clothes that were considered a ‘cheap brand’ that are 20 or 30 years old that still hold up.”
4. “The internet. Back in the day, you could tell if you were on a shady site because the advertisements were everywhere.”
“Now, every site you get on has shady ads. Even the social media sites.”
5. “Quality of almost everything. We’ve gone from repairing what we have to just replacing it when it breaks.”
6. “Air travel. Once upon a time, it was an exciting adventure and a pinnacle of customer service.”
“Roomy seats, good food, friendly flight attendants, and counter staff. People would dress up for the occasion. Now it’s a cattle car with some of the worst customer service ever that people only use if their destination is too far to reasonably drive.
“You expect rude and incompetent service, theft of your items, delays, and a reasonably good chance of starring in or filming a viral video involving violence of some kind. It’s fallen so far, it’s unbelievable.”
7. “Netflix. I wanna watch classic movies, but they’re just shoveling in Netflix Original series and 140-minute action movies.”
8. “American chocolate barely has flavor at all anymore. It’s like sugar with brown food coloring.”
“The only flavorful candy I’ve found lately is at places like ALDI, where they have international brands.”
9. “Talking on the phone. Growing up, it was what I wanted to do: talk on the phone.”
“Now, I have FaceTime turned off, messages on DND, and I only answer and talk on the phone if I have to. Totally lost its appeal to me through the years.”
10. “Comedy sitcoms used to be so good in the ’80s and ’90s; now they are garbage (with a few exceptions).”
“Sure, some drama ones are still good, but most of the comedy ones suck.”
“Not even as far back as the ’90s. The 2000s and early 2010s had The Office, Parks and Recreation, Arrested Development, 30 Rock, Community, and probably more I’m forgetting or didn’t watch. I can’t think of any current sitcoms that are good. Maybe it’s just the death of broadcast TV in general. Everything is a streaming series now that has to be super addictive, so you want to binge 10 hours in one sitting, and sitcoms just don’t work like that.”
11. “Shower heads. They used to actually shower you with water, like the heavy rain in a thunderstorm.”
“But nowadays they just spray thin, razor-sharp jets of water that barely even get you wet. I have my old shower head from the ’90s still plugged in, and I refuse to buy a new one even now that it leaks.”
12. “Cereal. I used to be so excited for Count Chocula season.”
“None of the chocolate cereals taste like chocolate anymore.”
13. “Twenty-year-old cars. There’s just a handful left that are cheap yet drivable.”
“Gone are the days when you could get one for $300, get a fake DOT, and drive it for two years with barely an oil change to keep it running. Now it’s, like, $2,000 for a beater with crash damage and no suspension.”
14. “Food in general. Restaurants aren’t as good anymore.”
“Everything just tastes the same or doesn’t taste at all. Eating out is for convenience, not flavor.”
15. “Children’s toys. My grandma still has my dad’s toys from when he was young.”
“They don’t make ’em like they used to.”
16. “College football. Every team is driven by greed. Rivalries ruined. Fans screwed.”
“How many Stanford and Cal fans are gonna go to games on the East Coast? Also, the games now last four hours, it seems.”
17. “Honeycrisp apples. Ten years ago, they were just incredible.”
“I avoid them at all costs now because they have no real flavor, imo.”
18. “Movies. The golden age of American cinema is long dead.”
“And now it’s mostly superhero movies, rom-coms, and remakes.”
19. “Egg McMuffins. So good when I was young, but now they are a shadow of the food they used to be.”
“I’m talking 1970s McMs.”
20. “Climbing Mount Everest. Don’t get me wrong, it’s no easy task.”
“However, commercial climbing has made the entire thing a circus with people that have no business being there, attempting to summit just because they can afford it. Let’s add the fact that Sherpa people do most of the heavy lifting (carrying supplies up the mountain, setting up ropes, etc.). And on top of that, turning Mount Everest into a garbage dump.”
21. “Burning Man has become the Mount Everest of hippie culture.”
“The real heads don’t do it anymore. It’s the type-A, accomplishment-oriented people who attend it now.”
— u/Yak-[username censored]-5000
22. “Music and live concerts. Most mainstream music is terrible today. Senseless.”
“Since Michael Jackson and Madonna started lip-syncing in the ’80s, live music is just a recording with people dancing and miming.”
— Anonymous, 58, Spain
23. “Colorado, definitely. Everything good about it was destroyed when people started flocking here in the 2010s.”
“The views are gone, the solitude is gone, the privacy is gone. The safety is gone, and the affordability is gone.”
— Anonymous
24. “American politics. Was never ‘good’ truthfully, but there is now no path forward that ends well.”
“… We’re living in the real-world Idiocracy.”
— dazzlingraptor30
25. “Everything. With everything so expensive, every little thing is about making money.”
“Because everything became about making money, everything got more expensive.”
— Anonymous