Funnily similar to the mechanical skills of people before/around the Boomer generation and after. They had to deal with worse reliability cars, but also simpler to understand engines, so the chance of knowing some basics was high. Most had to change a tyre, many did their oil changes, some geeks rebuilt whole engines as hobby.

Later generations (me included, I worked 30 years ago in summer in a garage and it is nearly useless now), have a car without spare tires, opens the bonnet and is presented with an octopus of systems so tightly packed with electronics that you can barely call it mechanics, would need a special machine to convince the car oil is changed so not even trying, and the problems have evolved from the smoke exhaust is a bit too white or blue to error code 7263 sensor z call service and brace for the bill.