Buy stuff. It breaks and you have to buy new stuff. It’s a cycle that can be wasteful, expensive for consumers and not good for the environment.

There’s a bill in the Oregon Legislature that tries to break the cycle.

Cellphones, game consoles, farm tractors, even hospital ventilators often come with strings attached. People who buy them can’t fix some aspects themselves. It requires getting manufacturers to come in with their own repair personnel and equipment.

It can mean extra hassle, expense and a lack of control. Some argue it’s an unfair trade practice.

It’s also been an issue in the battle against COVID-19. The New York Times reported a medical equipment technician at Memorial Hospital in Colorado Springs was trying to get hospital ventilators up and running. She could not. The manufacturer required its own technicians to work on the equipment.

A right to repair movement led by consumer groups has been fighting this battle for some time. Bills have been introduced in Congress to rein it in. In the Oregon Legislature this session, there is House Bill 2698.

The bill would require the manufacturer of the original equipment to make available to consumers the same parts, tools and documentation that are made available to authorized repair providers. Manufacturers would have to do so on “fair and reasonable terms.” The bill is generally focused on consumer electronics.

Manufacturers have opposed changes like this. They argue most consumers don’t just throw things away. They find ways to recycle their equipment. They also argue that consumers could get in over their heads, mess up the equipment and blame the manufacturer. Safety, privacy and security might be jeopardized. That might not be too big a deal if consumers just turns their own phones into paperweights. But if it puts a hospital ventilator into a nonrepairable state, that would be a bigger deal.

If there’s anything that we want most out of this legislation, it would be more action from manufacturers to make repairs easier for consumers, build things to last and move us away from a throwaway society.