@sickburnbro @EvilSandmich @ShovelTrouble It's not just availability of the part. For example, on a 70's GM or Ford, the same part will work in multiple models over a span of model-years - so 3rd parties could tool-up to make those parts, and sell them cheaper than GM/Ford - which also meant the GM/Ford part was sold cheaper (competition).

The Japs started the game of making unique parts for their cars which did not span models/years, so there was a much smaller market-share available for a given part. The USA makers then copied this idea.

All forms of "planned obsolescence" and similar should be illegal - from CPUs to auto-parts. It is evil - parasitic in nature. The purpose of the market-system is for us to get what we want, with profit as an incentive to get it made, and with better value being more popular = profitable. Products / business-models / practices that are contrary to this should be shut-down.

With CPUs, the difference between an Intel I3/5/7/9, is how much of the functionality they intentionally-cripple in the "cheaper" CPUs - where the cost to engineer "crippled, but still works," means the "cheaper" ones are actually more expensive in R&D, with the same production-cost.