Merth was pleased with the result, and she wrote a follow-up post a year later, as the coronavirus pandemic was spreading throughout the world and professionals with spare cash were overhauling their homes. Middle-class Americans were entering an era of immense choice in the workplace; at many companies, it was possible for the first time ever to work from practically anywhere. They just had to figure out where to put the home office.
In two blog posts on her flooring project, Merth linked to Home Depot’s Lifeproof page over a dozen times. But she didn’t realize at the time that the simplicity promised by Home Depot comes at an immense environmental and human cost. Vinyl flooring is seeing a surge of growth, boosted in part by pandemic-era renovations. The industry calls it “luxury vinyl tile.” In reality, it is layer upon layer of thin plastic, a heavily polluting concoction made with fossil fuels. Very often, a new report shows, that plastic is produced using forced labor.
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