Right to Repair laws are incredibly important to get passed at the state and federal levels of America. John Deere and Apple give a lot of lip service to protecting the environment, when in reality they seek profit above all else and specifically design their products to fail after the warranty period, and to be unrepairable. Creating a new phone (or 27,000 pound excavator!) requires massive amounts of energy and resources that damage the environment far more than the fake environmental gestures these companies make.
Our world would be a far better place if we pass Right to Repair laws: our money would go far further, and our environment would be healthier. Support DIY.
Tangent: patent laws are almost equally to blame for the lack of innovation. If Apple and John Deere had many competitors making similar products, then they couldn’t play the games of making products that are designed to fail. Patents grant artificial long term monopolies that prevent entrepreneurs and innovators from creating new products. Ideas are worthless, execution is everything. Reform or eliminate patent laws and watch how fast innovation starts to happen again. Henry Ford talked about how one man’s patent on something related to gas engines held back innovation for twenty years in the 1880s, the same thing is happening today, but far worse.