Why shop somewhere else and pay more for the same made-in-china stuff? It makes no sense to do so.

You can sit and type out "Fuck Wal-Mart" here all you want but if you're not typing that with a Wal-Mart receipt in one of your pockets, you're either a dumb ass or your bank account outweighs your common sense.

That $78 a month is pocket money, you know. Housing, basic food and clothes are provided by the state and the company they work for. Personally, I think $100-$120(US) would be on the high end of "ideal" for the Chinese who live in urban areas.

Like everything else here, even the story, it's just my opinion. :D

We have an entire room of IKEA bookcases. They've been in heavy duty use for over 10 years now, look fine and are holding up quite well, thank you. Took me about 3 hours one afternoon to assemble the 5 of them. If you took the time to actually look at and think about IKEA, you would realize that most of their products, while relative bargains, are not cheap in either of the two accepted meanings of the word.

is SMELL! How many times have you entered a home only to be turned off by a bad smell. Cooking smells don't count but dirty catboxes, unvacuumed rugs, pet hair, unemptied kitchen garbage, dirty dishes in the sink, unwashed kids, and yes, furniture that is manufactured in strange places using even stranger chemicals, glues, and paint.

I use the smell test when looking for inexpensive furniture. If it smells good I'll take a chance on it. If I don't like the smell it can stay in the store.

And they are what I use today, after four moves. No sagging. Yes, they were inexpensive. Maybe they were not ethically made; not sure.

But they are not disposable... because I have chosen not to dispose of them.

I think the quality of products found at IKEA and Walmart reflects the quality of the typical American consumer, perfectly.

Moving? Who's moving? We're $30,000 underwater in our house. Guess we might as well invest in that oak bookcase!

"We are a sad bunch, and we can't figure out why we're so god damned sad. We don't feel right, but we cannot look around and see what it is, materially, that makes us so spiritually vapid."

I'm sorry, but when people say "we," and they clearly mean "everyone else, but certainly not me," it drives me absolutely insane. Clearly, you are excepting yourself. So don't say "we," just say "you." Just say "All of you are a sad bunch, and you can't figure out why you're so goddamned sad. You don't feel right..." Because that's what you're saying anyway.

Frankly, I own plenty of inexpensive furniture, and I am not sad, nor "spiritually vapid." Honestly, if I were looking to my furniture or my bed linens to shore up my spirituality -- if I believed that the lack of attractive furniture were the problem with my soul -- I would consider myself to be in a sad state indeed.

It shocks me that there's no mention of the other entirely obvious reason people increasingly favor inexpensive furnishings like the ones at IKEA: People are far more mobile and are much more likely to move much more often in their lives than they were when breakfronts that had to be moved by professionals were the rule. I intentionally have not accumulated heavy, solid wood pieces meant to last a hundred years, because moving them is expensive and inconvenient, and I've moved twice in the last three years. People change jobs more, they move more, and they don't stay in the same houses where they grew up as often.

I DO understand and agree with the low-wage worker and safety issues, as well as the disposability issue as relates to landfills. I consider those entirely valid and fair arguments, if ones I've heard pretty frequently. (Though as others have noted, the fact that furniture is cheap doesn't necessarily mean it doesn't last -- I have particle-board bookcases that are fifteen years old, don't sag, and look exactly as they were when they were purchased. I don't use them as art; I use them for holding up books.)

But the main anti-IKEA argument seems to be that the author's personal set of priorities should be everyone's -- that everyone SHOULD care about what a lamp looks like, when some people just...don't. Some people want a lamp to provide light as inexpensively as possible. If you honestly don't get any more happiness from an ornate lamp than from a simple one, why would you waste money you could spend on something that actually makes you happier, like travel or whatever personally has value to you?

then IKEA actually sounds pretty damned good.

(Hope this isn't a duplicate, but I must have hit send when I didn't mean to.)

America: buy lots of silly stuff; go shopping to fill time or for a diversion; buy five in every color when one would do; replace stuff before it wears out because it's 'old'; throw away perfectly good stuff because it's 'time for new decor'.

Europe (for an example): buy carefully and take your time deciding whether you need this thing; go shopping when you need something; take care of stuff when it gets old (even 'old' people); buy classic stuff, concentrate on good design, so that it looks good for a long long time.

So, how is this the fault of Wal-Mart or IKEA?

the job market we currently live with, which has become increasingly volatile only fosters this kind of behavior. in a climate where you might be forced to move in one year or three, who wants to invest $2k in a beast of an oak bookcase you'll just have to haul from Ohio to Denver, carry up 3 flights of stairs and that will gouge your floors? when people have the job security that would justify keeping a book case for longer than a year, they might have a reason to invest in quality.

the manufacturing companies putting the squeeze on labor are not only improving their bottom line by exploiting their employees, but by creating a more transient work force, they are widening their cusomer base.