Are you aware of what (if anything) has changed significantly since then?

As far as I know it hasn't - there's an article like this every year or so in the British press, and they all have similar conclusions.

Furthermore, if the linked article is right, it should be pretty difficult to change this structure.

I don't know whether anything has changed or not, but given that it is an old article something may have.

When I first read an article, I assume it is current. I only realized this article wasn't current because it mentioned that Japan opened its first Ikea store "in April", and I knew it had Ikea for several years at which point I checked the date.