This will never happen with incandescent bulbs because the lifespan vs efficiency trade off is fundamental to how they work. More power means more heat which causes it to fail faster. However, this did end up happening eventually with the invention of LED bulbs and now many big companies formerly in the cartel (including Phillips) are in the process of shutting down or selling off their lighting division because it's no longer profitable to sell light bulbs when LEDs last so long.
>The British monopolies commission effectively colluded with them by first decided that there should be a single lifetime as a standard
Just as companies today agree on standards like USB or WiFi, back then they also agreed to a standard bulb life and efficiency. This means that one company's bulbs are interoperable with another's and you don't end up with a house full of mismatched bulbs.
>And I would happily pay an extra $5 in electricity for a bulb that reduced my need to change them.
This doesn't account for the extra greenhouse emissions and environmental effects of running inefficient bulbs. Also, long life bulbs were never banned, even when the cartel was active. You've always been able to buy them if you wish, most people didn't because they had a poor lumens/watt
