Stenebo, a 20 year veteran of the company, headed up IKEA's GreenTech division and had quit thanks to what he describes as a crisis of conscience. "The company was easier to run when (founding director Igmar) Kamprad played the role of an ascetic, slightly dim geriatric," Stenebo says. "Apart from that, the petit bourgeois façade helped to push down prices with suppliers." IKEA, the largest furniture company in the world, is also one of the largest users of wood in the world, and it keeps prices low by sourcing timber from the Russian Far East and China, where forestry practices are--to put it kindly--questionable. Cheap furniture--like cheap clothes, cheap food, cheap electronics--come loaded with a long list of externalized costs--most of them unknown to consumers. 

Despite its Scandinavian elan and cool image, IKEA is no different from any other highly profitable discount retail chain--it keeps its prices low by paying its suppliers as little as possible, and scouring the globe for cheap labor and cheap resources. At IKEA the meatballs may be tasty and the designs adorable, but environmental and human rights concerns take a far back seat to profit.      

Basic economics tells us that human beings tend to follow the money. In the late 1990s, the dot com boom sent many very smart and hard working youngsters in the direction of computer science--at MIT, the famous "Course 6" (electrical engineering and computer science) was the hottest offering on campus. And MIT was not alone--enrollments soared in programs across the country. But with the post dot com bomb climate for computer geeks not nearly as sunny,  these ultra-smart and eager hordes are looking elsewhere.  

Whining and hand wringing over the state of science and math education in this country will have little impact if the jobs for scientists, engineers and mathematicians remain so uncertain, and so readily outsourced or filled by visa holders from abroad. Young Americans are not nearly so lazy or stupid as many pundits make them out to be--the best and the brightest will turn to math and science only if and when it pays to do so. 

Photo Credit: Flickr User woodleywonderworks

Say what?  There's a growing body of evidence to show that extremely well educated Americans are scrambling for work--some with advanced degrees in science and engineering from the country's most demanding institutions of higher learning.  But wait, education is not enough -- we must hustle, too. Friedman quotes another unnamed "friend" a lawyer whose firm has gone through a series of lay-offs. This friend shares the "interesting" observation that "lawyers who were used to just showing up and having work handed to them were the first to go because with the bursting of the credit bubble, that flow of work just isn't there. But those who have the ability to imagine new services, new opportunities and new ways to recruit work were being retained. They are the new untouchables." 

Who are these untouchables?  Well, certainly not the "average" among us, that great majority of ordinary humans who simply know how to do a job and do it well. "It's all about what chocolate sauce, whipped cream and cherry you can put on top," Friedman concludes. "So our schools have a doubly hard task now -- not just improving reading, writing and arithmetic but entrepreneurship, innovation and creativity."

Last time I looked, schools were having a hard enough time teaching kids the basics--now they are expected to "teach" creativity and entrepreneurship? One wonders how Mr. Friedman would have managed as an independent entrepreneur without the power of the Times to back him. But one wonders even more about the reasoning of a commenter who argues that the average American doesn't have a chance in this new global economy, and that only the extraordinary deserve a place in his brave new world.      

(Photo: Flickr/GIHE)

The New York Times reports today that drywall imported from China and used in newly built homes in the U.S. emits fumes that can lead to headaches, nose bleeds and other nasty symptoms. Apparently, the fumes also corrode and/or turn "every piece of metal indoors" black. 

The Times goes on: "While tainted Chinese imports like toothpaste, pet food and baby formula have been quickly removed from store shelves, drywall is installed throughout homes and does not lend itself to a quick fix."

The Times was rather late to this story. Last spring the EPA tested a batch of Chinese made drywall and found it emitted not only sulfur, but also excessive amounts of strontium compounds. 

Chinese-made drywall is used in American homes because it is cheaper than American- made drywall. That is the one and only reason. But this incident leads to a question: What shortcuts are required to make a product as heavy as drywall so cheaply that it can compete in this country on price even after being shipped halfway around the globe?

Photo Credit: Flickr Users exfordy and Bone.P7

Last month, Hyatt Hotels Corp. fired 98 housekeepers, many of them veteran employees who made $15-per-hour, and replaced them with $8-per-hour "temporary" workers provided by Hospitality Staffing Solutions, an outsourcing firm in Atlanta. While the details are murky, and Hospitality Staffing Solutions has refused to respond to this correspondent's repeated request for specifics, at least some of these new employees are reportedly "guest workers'' on H-2B visas. 

The guest workers were trained by the Hyatt veterans, who were told the new recruits were not replacements, but part-timers who would "fill in" for sick and vacationing permanent workers. According to union officials, after successfully training the new workers, the Hyatt veterans were told to clean out their lockers for "health purposes." They gamely did so. The next day they were told to hit the road. 

The H-2B visa program was designed to allow employers to hire temporary help for peak and holiday periods; for example wait staff and construction workers during the summer months. Now, it seems, outsourcing firms are luring H-2B's to what in better times would be permanent positions, but due to today's crushing unemployment are breezily turned into part-time, some-time jobs without benefits or a living wage. Since H-2B holders are tied to this country by their jobs, they have no power to object to conditions or terms.  Voiceless and without recourse, they are to some minds the ideal employees--they keep their mouths closed, their complaints to themselves, and their eyes averted.   

This episode recalls the old story of Mr. Snake and Mr. Toad. Snake offers to carry Toad across a rising river, promising not to bite him.  Toad agrees, and hops on for the ride. Half way across the river Snake coils back and bites him. Toad's dying words are: "You promised not to, why, oh why?"  Snake responds sadly: "Because I'm a snake." 

Cutting costs, especially labor costs, is the quickest and easiest way to pad the bottom line. But this race to the bottom is not only immoral, it is debilitating in the long term. A low wage, transient workforce is a shaky base from which to build a corporate pyramid. Indeed, history shows it will not stand. Yet, despite self-serving rhetoric claiming otherwise, this is increasingly the direction corporations chose to go. Rather than innovate or perform their way out of whatever difficulty they're in, companies cut their workforce and their payroll and hope for the best.  

Hyatt replaced an experienced, loyal workforce with a bevy of ill-paid temporary workers with no voice and few rights. This is not surprising. What is surprising is that so far, they seem to be getting away with it. Brian Lang, vice president of the Unite Here Local 26, which represents Boston's hospitality workers, told me that what happened at the Hyatt was the worst infringement of worker rights he'd wittnessed in his entire career. Let's try to make sure it remains the worst, rather than being just a taste of what's to come.  Mr. Snake cannot help being a snake. But it's a fool's game to hop on its back and hope for a smooth ride to shore.

Photo Credit: Flickr User markhillary

Pollan writes: 

AGRIBUSINESS dominates the agriculture committees of Congress, and has swatted away most efforts at reform. But what happens when the health insurance industry realizes that our system of farm subsidies makes junk food cheap, and fresh produce dear, and thus contributes to obesity and Type 2 diabetes? It will promptly get involved in the fight over the farm bill -- which is to say, the industry will begin buying seats on those agriculture committees and demanding that the next bill be written with the interests of the public health more firmly in mind.

So, as with so many things, food offers us a choice:  pay me now, or pay me later.  Frankly, given the quality of life costs incured by a food system built around quick profit rather than human needs, this choice seems like a no brainer to me.   

Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons

I suppose this makes sense in some universe, but not the one I inhabit.  China is not an island unto itself.  The push for ever lower prices has suppliers of all nationalities struggling to minimize costs, resulting in growing unemployment, less job security, and lost income and lower quality of life for millions of Americans.  Meanwhile, the cost of health care, education, and other necessities continues to climb.  Cheap t-shirts and toys are poor compensation for an unemployed home owner struggling to make his or her mortgage payments.  And the production and distribution of cheap, disposable goods threaten not only China's environment, but our own.  

Ms. Allen is perhaps most famous for her Washington Post opinion piece entitled "We Scream, We Swoon, How Dumb Can We Be?" the "we" being women.  In it she argues that "The theory that women are the dumber sex...is amply supported by neurological and standard testing evidence."  Ms. Allen goes on:  "I am perfectly willing to admit that I myself am a classic case of female mental deficiencies." Putting aside for a moment why the Washington Post would publish the musings of a self-defined "mental deficient," one must ask a deeper question:  why a major metropolitan newspaper would chose to share with its readers the ravings of someone whose views are so clearly out of line with reality.   Could it be the more than one thousand protests readers launched objecting to this bit of idiocy?  Do all those protests make the paper feel more valued, more popular, more loved?   

There's an old cliche that a sure way to draw attention to oneself is by pulling down one's pants.  Yes, it gets eyeballs, but to what end?  One would hope that in these days of shrinking subscriber lists and revenues, newspapers will come to understand that while printing unsubstantiated ideological rants might indeed grab plenty of eyeballs, it is not the way to grab hearts and minds. 

GS1 DataBar (formerly Reduced Space Symbology or RSS) symbols can identify small items and carry more information than the current EAN/UPC bar code. GS1 DataBar enables Global Trade Item Number® (GTIN®) identification for hard-to-mark products, such as apples, pears or other types of loose produce. It also can carry GS1 Application Identifiers, such as serial numbers, lot numbers, and expiration dates, which creates the opportunity for solutions supporting product authentication and traceability, product quality and effectiveness, variable measure product identification, and couponing.

Yes, that's right, these babies are small enough to stick on individual pieces of fruit, making tracing stuff back to its source a relatively simple matter.  That means we could trace any number of goods--from bras to hammers to Tommy Toy Train sets-- to the individual factory where they were made--simply by plugging barcode data into the company's website. 

Those in doubt might note that Wal-Mart has already taken up the practice--at least in a line of Love Earth jewelry, the lineage of which can be traced back from Sam's Club showcase to a specific gold mine.  Icebreaker, a company specializing in woolen garments, labels sweaters with a "baacode" they claim allows you to trace the wool back to an individual sheep.

Were retailers required--or even requested--to code all their wares, I wonder if the supply chain leading to sweat shops might find a new direction...     

Slurs aside, these angry folks subscribe to the "Sweatshops are A Dream" view of history, a view I do not share. 

What are your thoughts?

Rule of law makes it difficult to produce things at the China Price, so we go where rule of law is loose or absent, take what we need, and leave. Sometimes we leave great fortunes, for the few. Often, we leave a great mess - in environmental degredation, human rights abuses, that sort of thing. This is not sustainable, and it has certainly come back to haunt us - in job security, in economic stability, in just about every aspect of our lives. So next time you find that terrific bargain on tube socks or t-shirts or electronics, you might want to ask yourself - do you still not believe you're getting what you pay for?

"Just in time for the current economic recession, Shell  investigates America's fixation with discount retail prices.This highly intelligent and disturbing book provides invaluable insight into our consumer culture and should be mandatory reading for anyone trying to figure out our current financial mess. As Shell proves, the hunt for cheap products has hurt us all. Highly recommended for smart readers." --Richard Drezen (Washington Post) for Library Journal, Starred Review

I look forward to reading and responding to your thoughts on cheap culture...

Outsourcing pollution--and the illness and death linked to it--has long been the norm for many multi-national corporations, as anyone who has spent much time in China knows. A  Carnegie Mellon study concluded that the United States may be reducing its own carbon emissions by importing goods from countries that are creating even more emissions.  The impact of this is most deeply felt by the poor, few of whom have anything to say about it.   But we do.   We can think twice before purchasing products that endanger the communities they are made in, even if it means paying a few pennies more. And we can demand that multi-national companies that represent American interests insist on pollution controls and worker protections.  In an increasingly "flat" world, can we really afford to do any less?

   "The 5,500-square-foot thrift outlet is a laboratory of sorts for Goodwill and its 2,200 stores around the country. Intent on sprucing up an image that conjures low-end castoffs and no-frills ambience, many Goodwill stores are courting the shoppers who scour high-end resale shops and department store sales racks for bargains."

  The especially good news here is that the recycling of high quality merchandize--in this case thoughtfully crafted clothing--has suddenly become not only acceptable but cool.  What a wonderful alternative to the trend toward "disposable" clothing--the cheaply made "shabby chic" we've endured for too long at H&M and its ilk.  What cartoon superstar Homer Simpson calls "fallapart" is precisely what American consumers have come to expect from too many of our purchases.  How wonderful that today's "recessionistas" are fighting back by flocking to low cost, high quality "kindly used" garments--that they may even pass down to their kids!