There are quite a few things made today you could make that statement of... french press, steel cooking utensils/pans, ceramic dishware, gas range/oven, gym weights, woodworking hand tools, leather and wool clothes, solid wood furniture, flower pots... There's still a lot of things made today that last. You just won't find them at Wal-Mart or Amazon.
I once bought a knife set at walmart with 20ish pieces for less than $20. Sure, they won't be crazy tough, and sure they probably won't hold an edge very well, but it had a huge variety of knives and with a $5 sharpener they could last a decade in service. I have a smaller collection of Henkels for day to day use but I never got rid of the cheap ones because they are fantastic when I don't have the right Henkels knife and don't want to spend $80 on one knife that I will use twice a year.
