If you had to, would you rather work for Wal-Mart in Communist China or in the Land of the Free and Home of the Brave?

Until this month, most people would have probably preferred, on balance, to smile in the aisles of an American Wal-Mart. But now workers in Shenyang, a decidedly unsexy city in China's north-east, have pulled off a coup that might cause one to think again.