Comment by dboreham
2 years ago
Possibly the issue is more to do with the lower cost of the engineered material?
Like, when tobacco cost a megabuck per oz in Queen Elizabeth times people smoked a pipe once in a while and in the context of their high exposure to fireplace smoke it was no big deal. Fast forward to when cigarettes cost 10c/pack and the marketing guys are selling them to 8 year olds...now it's a huge health problem.
If you're only paying a small amount for the materials, most people will be a lot more price sensitive on installation, so there's a race to the bottom.
Also, if the material is expensive, it pays off to measure exactly and order the material cut to the correct dimensions rather than just cut it on site, because if you slip with the angle grinder your mistake costs 2000€.
That just seems like a policy that punishes the poor. It's like banning commercial flights for greenhouse gas reasons but letting private jets fly.
>poor
it's a luxury product, far from the cheapest countertop options.
I think it has more to do with the explosion of use in the market, it's everywhere now (from McMansions to cheap apartments). It is was just cheap/expensive enough to replace laminated MDF benchtops.
I suggest people look at the actual numbers -> https://lungfoundation.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/NSP...
Every one of them over zero is bad, but I was surprised how small the sample of active cases actually are. It would have been better to show the change year on year though.
I was surprised that the sample rate was so few, that is active cases.