I had had the experience of driving work trucks at night that have these. I hate them. They are unsafe. You cannot see anything with them. Just two weak narrow beams of light. I think they need to be outlawed. To be honest I don't know how people could drive at night back in the day when these were standard on all vehicles.
Please give your opinion.
They likely had lowest-bidder headlights, or a bad charging system. Usually, sealed-beam headlights have an advantage because the glass is always replaced. Later headlights that use plexiglass or a variant suffer from road rash, discoloration, and turning opaque with time.
What type of headlights... thats what matters. If they are crappy DOT headlights running 9004 bulbs... they stink no matter what. Crappy wiring only compounds the problem as less power gets to the lights. Best mod one can do if they are sealed beams is to find replacement e-code H4 housings, or if you have separate low+high housings, an H1+H4 setup and relay the whole system. Technically European lights aren't road legal in the US (they lack the DOT markings), but the light output is WAY better.
Modern headlights are often brighter, but I never had any trouble seeing with sealed beam headlights.
My 1990 Chevy van still has those and I can see fine. Of course, I'm up a bit higher than a passenger car.
Old sealed beams are horrible, yes - but proper aim can make a big difference.
That said, I replaced the sealed beams in one of my cars with Euro-compliant retrofits (http://pbase.com/mr740ti/hellas). The difference was pretty astounding.