The average American now holds onto their smartphone for 29 months, according to a recent survey by Reviews.org, and that cycle is getting longer. The average was around 22 months in 2016.

While squeezing as much life out of your device as possible may save money in the short run, especially amid widespread fears about the strength of the consumer and job market, it might cost the economy in the long run, especially when device hoarding occurs at the level of corporations.

Research released by the Federal Reserve last month concludes that each additional year companies delay upgrading equipment results in a productivity decline of about one-third of a percent, with investment patterns accounting for approximately 55% of productivity gaps between advanced economies. The good news: businesses in the U.S. are generally quicker to reinvest in replacing aging equipment. The Federal Reserve report shows that if European productivity had matched U.S. investment patterns starting in 2000, the productivity gap between the U.S and European economic heavyweights would have been reduced by 29 percent for the U.K., 35 percent for France, and 101% for Germany.

  • notsure@fedia.io
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    8
    ·
    1 day ago

    …hands up anyone using laptops or desktops older than 15 years?.. …right here, bitches…lol…

    • FirstCircle@lemmy.ml
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      2
      ·
      16 hours ago

      I’ve got a “refurbished” Dell laptop that’s about 15yrs old. Some ex-corp model. 4C/8T, 16" 1900x1200-ish display, Nvidia GPU, 20G RAM, and it’s still going strong except for the battery which stopped holding a charge. I could get a new battery but I use the system rarely and just for browsing/email so running it off the AC brick is fine. It’s been running Linux Mint for as long as I can remember. My phone is a cheapo model from 2021 and it is also fine. The only reason I might replace it is if the battery tanks like with my other phones (planned obsolescence) or if I finally decide it’s mandatory to up my security/privacy game and need a phone that runs GrapheneOS, which means a Pixel. An old used one.