I am not sure where to post, here or zenhabits, so I will post in both places :)
I am gIad to see this brought up, but I think this article is poorly framed (and I am dismayed by a lot of the comments on zenhabits). This isn’t nostalgia versus efficiency - this is short term versus long term. Big Box stores have an important advantage over independent small stores: they are so big that they can afford to artificially lower their prices and operate at a loss until they have driven competitors out of business, then they are free to raise their prices right back up. You think they don’t eventually charge what the market will bear?
Secondly, large chains have political clout and are able to get incentives (tax breaks and even tax money) just to come to small towns, where local politicians hope they will bring money and jobs. In Walmart’s case, that has not always turned out the way people hoped.
Final, a poster on zenhabits weirdly claimed that now that America has such a big middle class it can no longer affor the mom and pop shops. The mom and pop shop owners *were* the middle class. The new employees at Walmart are not middle class. Less mom and pops, more Walmarts: the trend is clear, and not exactly in favour of a growing middle class.
Finally, as mentioned, to make things cheap, they hire cheap labour and use cheaply made foreign materials. This makes a literally cheaper product: lesser quality, lesser price. And American money flows out of the country and standards of quality control and employee remuneration get ground down. That is a cost, paid by the community. There are benefits to large chains, and I use them myself, but I don’t devote myself to accumulating the most stuff. I buy quality and I buy less. The qulity items I buy, last. So I paid more in the short term, but gained in the long term. I consume less, because I am beginning to see that everything does have a cost. And cost and value are not only dollar issues.
I wish this article had not framed the debate as “cute old timey America (sadly too expensive) vs. the new efficient Corporate America” but rather: are we interested in saving for the short term or the long term?
