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85 Comments
- Aidenag, on 10/12/2007, -8/+32well ill say this much, ive never met anyone that went "up the ladder" to the point they could start a family from walmart... in fact i rarely even see walmart employees that have much of anything.. at least if they accually work at one of the stores.
Place is a disease on any region it lands in... even worse it buys most of its products from lowest bidder sweat shops from around the globe but mostly SE asia... - bugsy187, on 10/12/2007, -9/+20@akcoder
Walmart generates profit by driving down wadges and living conditions, while enriching upper management and wealthy shareholders. They work to undermine the beginnings of any unions that might protect reasonable, living wadges. They also drive surrounding businesses out of business, because a mom and pop shop can't compete with 3rd world sweatshops using child labor, unrestrained pollution, and wadge slave pay. The theory is that these societies will be built up, but it doesn't work that way. The benefits are highly concentrated in upper management, while people struggle to make enough to eat. Walmart's model is to drive the world into a long work hour, low benefit society. It's good for the masters but very negative to everyone else.
What's with your contempt for honest working people, by the way? - bugsy187, on 10/12/2007, -2/+10@budsstud26
If unions are such a scourge to business, then why after world war 2, when America was it's most unionized, did America experience it's most growth? How do you explain that the most unionized airlines are among the most profitable? How are people going to spend if they don't have any money?
You're arguing, essentially, to keep wealth in the investing (wealthy) rather than the consuming (poor) end of the economy, as if this will create more wealth for all. But I can make the opposite argument, that consuming will stimulate growth.
Unions hire economists, they understand how to distribute wealth so as not to choke out the company. It's reasonable, rational, and civilized to GUARANTEE quality education, health care, and working conditions for ALL people. Think of it as an investment in the future. If we don't do this, we have uneducated, inefficient, injured and miserable workers. There are financial costs with this, if the outright amoral nature of this, are very high. Crime also plays into societies where people have no practical future. Unions are the best institutions to democratically press the needs and values of working people. Leaving ourselves to the mercy of 'benevolent' leaders is unwise and historically a failure. - amonthei, on 10/12/2007, -4/+11Excuse me, "service wise"?
Other than their ridiculous return policy I think the word 'service' should never be used when talking about Wal-Mart - akcoder, on 10/12/2007, -13/+20The reality is that love it or hate it, Wal-Mart provides jobs for people who would usually be otherwise unemployed. That said, I think its unrealistic for people working at Wal-Mart to expect to make professional wages. If you want decent wages, get an education.
And don't tell me it can't be done, I know people who are working at Wal-Mart right now going to college to make something of their lives.
The bottom line is Wal-Mart is an entry level job that doesn't require a brian surgeon to fill. - bugsy187, on 10/12/2007, -6/+12"walmart = pwnage at least shopping wise they are cheap and carry stuff that most other stores sell but dont over price"
@Atomic1fire
The prices are cheap, because Walmart strips wealth from working people around the globe. It harms regular people like you and me. - londoneconomist, on 10/12/2007, -3/+9I can think of about 15 things right now that I can buy at my local corner store that Wal-Mart will never carry. There is a certain amount of utility provided by main street local shops that deliver unique goods to a community that Wal-Mart won't ever satisfy. Wal-Mart will drive these shops out of business by using their monopsony power to sell cheaper paper towels, batteries, and orange juice, but when you want a weird bottle of wine, a cool birthday card, or anything else that only a wide variety of small shops can provide, Wal-Mart will never deliver.
- rjp_wayne2018, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6I am a Customer Service Manager at a Wal-Mart store in South Dakota. Wal-Mart has treated me best out of any other job i've had, including Target. At Wal-Mart when I first started, i got paid a full $2.45 more than i started at Target. Not to mention the benefits i recieve for being an associate (benefits including discounts on items in the store, travel, heath, and much more). I am in my Senior year of college, and plan to go into Management for what I see as really good money. I dont understand why everyone thinks that Wal-Mart is such a horrible company. If any other company was in it's place (being the largest retailer in the United States), it would be under just as much observation. My point is, Wal-Mart has the image of being such a horrible company because it is always in the spotlight. The news only reports on the negative because the stories get more ratings. Compare pros and cons of any business with Wal-Mart and im sure you will find just as many negative topics.
- Y2JCrisis, on 10/12/2007, -2/+7I just wish people who shop at wal-mart would quit bitching about how things aren't made as well as they used to be. This is incredibly ironic because Wal-mart thrives on the same principle. Low cost at the price of quality.
- leszek, on 10/12/2007, -3/+7can you give us a link to this "data" ...
- rokinroj, on 10/12/2007, -2/+6Of all the dumb ass responses above, this on takes the cake. Is that what you think you are paying for? The minimum wage cashiers and stock boys? Here is the list of top 10 richest people in the world. Pay special attention to numbers 6-10. Any idea who they are? Yeah, ok the mark up goes to the employees. Open you eyes!
The Top Ten
William H. Gates
Warren E. Buffett
Paul G. Allen
Michael Dell
Lawrence Ellison
Christy Walton
Jim C. Walton
S. Robson Walton
Alice L. Walton
Helen R. Walton - geekee, on 10/12/2007, -2/+6I think the real question is, what price mark-up should customers be burdened with to pay people to run cash registers, stock shelves, and help customers? Are these jobs really careers for a person to raise a family doing? Are they jobs for immigrant workers and college students? Are they supplemental income for retirees on social security? What added benefit is there to the consumer by paying larger salaries for this unskilled labor, particularly in an environment where immigration laws are not enforced, and immigrants are willing to work for much lower pay?
- the_josh23, on 10/12/2007, -3/+7I work in the optical division. The wages are significantly better than the store which I used to work at. Our biggest problem has been the health benefits. Every year there is an increase in cost but a decline in what is covered. I know of many married couples that work together there. If they have kids their health care costs can be unbelievably expensive. The only plus side is in some communities Walmart is one of the largest local employers, and most of the time moving to find a better job results in a higher cost of living.
- n3m3s1s, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Anyone who has taken a reasonably worthwhile economics course, high school or college, or even read a little Smith or Mises could confirm the economic truth. Even if I don't like Wal-Mart, they give cheap prices to people who need it and unskilled jobs to people who need them. Voluntary trade means benefit for all parties involved.
- Silencer7, on 10/12/2007, -2/+5When there are signs in the employee room advising them to apply for federal assistance, no, they're probably not being paid a living wage. "Nickel and Dimed" details this quite well.
- fyngyrz, on 10/12/2007, -2/+5amonthi: "My point is that if you try to find someone who can assist you in buying the correct product or offer any advice on which product you buy it will never compare to a smaller specialized store, or really any other store out there that carries the product."
Hmmm. Well, let me approach that this way: I'm an expert in electronics (EE, designer of computers and consumer electronics until I inherited a literary agency), and a musician. I'm 50. I've lived in NYC, Ft. Lauderdale, Atlanta, and Montana. In all my years, the number of *actually* informed people I've run into in, for instance, Radio Shack or Lafayette Radio stores has been very, very low. Example: I had some clown tell me just a few weeks ago how "optical signals got distorted when the optical cables were over 3 feet, and so that's why we don't have longer optical cables." While I take your point that it would be lovely to be served by informed folks, experts, even, I can't see that happening for any retail wage. I could so serve you in an electronics setting, but my wages... definitely, there's your problem. :)
So if I wander into wham-a-lart and the guy in the electronics section is unable to tell me anything coherent about when, or if, they're ever going to carry amplified component video switches (or even what they are) I guess I'm just not ready to "blame" either the store or the employee for it. I try to be an informed consumer before I buy; that works for me and it eliminates most need of an informed salesperson (and it also eliminates their ability to ***** me, which has been useful more than once, let me tell you.) - tool_army, on 10/12/2007, -3/+6I work at Wal-Mart ISD, the tech division of the Home Office, in Bentonville, Arkansas. I just started last week, and went through orientation and all of that, but I will say this: Wal-Mart is 100% focused on *complete* satisfaction of both the customer and the associates. It's truly unbelievable hearing the business side of things here in Bentonville. Walmartfacts.com is a great site to learn about the, well...facts about Wal-Mart. I'm not saying the company is perfect, but I certainly don't consider them the evil corporation that many "outsiders" do.
I know to many people working in a Wal-Mart store is a dead-end job. That may be the case, depending on the supervisor or store manager, but I think it ultimately comes down to the individual associate's goals. Many people that I've spoke with think of Wal-Mart as a job, rather than a career. That's fine. The retail market will always have high turnover. However, that's certainly not the case for everyone. I watched a presentation at ISD from Kevin Turner (a senior level VP at Sam's Club), and not only did he start out at Wal-Mart as a cashier, but he was one of the most intelligent, well-spoken men I've ever heard give a presentation. The point of this is to say this: it may be difficult, and possibly even rare, to work your way up in the chain at Wal-Mart, but it certainly isn't impossible. During the past week that I've been here, I've met many people that work in Bentonville (all divisions included) that started working in the stores.
Your career will only be as good as you strive for it to be! Don't aim for the sky, aim for the stars. I'm learning all of this slowly, and I hope to have a great career at Wal-Mart, or wherever my career takes me! - budsstud26, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4@bugsy
I'd sure like to see some data to back up your claims. Also, correlation != causation. There were quite a few factors that contributed to the economic growth following WWII.
How do you explain the fact that the majority of the world's most profitable and fast-growing businesses are not unionized, while many facing bankruptcy are? Hourly assembly line union workers at Delphi (which went into bankruptcy last year) were making an average of $65 / hr (including all forms of compensation). This is equal to $130,000 per year for what is essentially a blue collar job. Awesome for the workers, but unsustainable ultimately, especially in today's age of global competition. I suggest you read "The World is Flat." Your idealistic view of unions in today's global economy is naive and uninformed.
Nobel-prize winning economist Milton Friedman:
"If unions raise wage rates in a particular occupation or industry, they necessarily make the amount of employment available in that occupation or industry less than it otherwise would be-just as any higher price cuts down the amount purchased. The effect is an increased number of persons seeking other jobs, which forces down wages in other occupations. Since unions have generally been strongest among groups that would have been high-paid anyway, their effect has been to make high-paid workers higher paid at the expense of lower-paid workers. Unions have therefore not only harmed the public at large and workers as a whole by distorting the use of labor; they have also made the incomes of the working class more unequal by reducing the opportunities available to the most disadvantaged workers." ("Capital and Freedom" 1962. p. 124) - SPARTACVS, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Big Box Mart.
http://www.jibjab.com/JokeBox/JokeBox_JJOrig.aspx?movieid=122
Relates to this article pretty well. - captainahab, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Right. The key word here is "voluntary." If this was an article about sexual practices everyone would be emphasizing the phrase "consenting adults." Well, Wal-Mart's success is all about the actions of "consenting adults." No one forces people to work at Wal-Mart. No one forces people to shop at Wal-Mart. And yet both activities are popular enough that Wal-Mart is one of the world's biggest companies.
So basically we have a typical situation with "progressives," they want to intervene and keep people from exercising their own personal economic freedoms. - akcoder, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3@the_josh, how is that different than *ANY* other company? At every company I've worked for in the past 6 years my health care costs have gone up year over year.
- ZamboniDriver, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I hear you talk about "scum of the earth" and how, on Friday evenings, it reminds some of you of the Cantina on Tattoine. Are you better than those people? I'd love to see you walk into a Walmart on a Friday evening and tell those employees and customers exactly what you think of them. Better yet, go make a sign, and camp out on the sidewalk near a Walmart, and tell the employees and customers that they are losers, scum of the earth.
There is one part of your claim that amazes me.... if you know what it's like in there on a Friday evening, are you not the same as those people?
People bitch and moan about Walmart. Yet Walmart keeps doing well. I don't get it. If it's as bad as you people say it is, shouldn't it be easy to compete with them?
I have it: Offer better products from anywhere BUT Asia?
How about hire UNION employees. That oughta make for a GREAT store.
The truth is most of you people are hypocrites. Publicly, you bitch about Walmart, yet you all seem to shop there. It comes down to greed. But you can't seem to stand by whatever morals you seem to want Walmart to exhibit. If, collectively, you had some balls, you would stay away, and support the small town merchants. And the "quality" union-made products.
I think all you gutless whiners should start your own store... and stock it with ONLY union-made products... and only allow the BEAUTIFUL people in on Friday evenings.
Let's see how you do. I'd LOVE to see it. Let me go on the record to say that I predict massive failure. The cost of products produced by union labor would be nearly triple the cost of "worthless Asian-made junk."
Speaking of unions... I was in a union. CWA for 3 years. I watched lazy, good-for-nothing idiots with 20 years get high paying high tech jobs, and sit on their dead asses, without any ability to complete the work in front of them while people with the abilities and who desperately wanted to work forced to take low-paying, low tech jobs, risking layoffs almost continously. And watching the unions stewards protect the 20, 25, and 30 year people made me sick. 25% of them were not capable of doing the job they were holding. Yet there wasn't anything that could be done. I was lucky. I was smart enough to get out, take an engineering position, and quickly move up. I definitely believe in merit pay. Put in the time and effort, and get rewarded for it. That IS the American way. The American way is NOT to get drunk and show up for work, and be protected from getting fired simply because you have 25 years of seniority.
Or for the UAW, smoke pot, and then build some cars. The local Ford plant has a revolving door policy with drug-addicted, alcoholic UAW members protected for decades against discipline from management. And people wonder why Toyota is kicking the Big 3's ass.
And here's the final kicker: Look at any liberal driving a car... look at the car they drive! Little foreign piece of ***** from Asia. And they cry bloody murder about union jobs. And they complain exporting jobs over to India. Yet they don't care about American UAW jobs. Hypocrites.
Unions are next to worthless. That's one reason why Walmart, if you had no education, would be a great place to work. You could move up so fast if you just had the willpower. If the employees and the customers are truly the dregs of society, then for someone with 1/2 a brain, it wouldn't be hard to move into management... to get a college degree along the way, and make a lot of money. - amonthei, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3fyngyrz: The point of londoneconomist was that Wal-Mart may push some stores out of business that offer things that he can not find anywhere else. The 15 things that he could think of will not keep a business alive.
Do some homework on the negative business practices of Wal-Mart and you will soon see that their priorities are not with the consumer. - born, on 10/12/2007, -6/+8You don't really understand not having a college degree, do you?
The people who work at WalMart don't have many other options. - xelloss, on 10/12/2007, -4/+6Wow its far from slave labor, I don't know how your Walmarts are but our walmart pays just as much as any store type business in the area and the employees are not working like slaves, they just wander around and put price tags on things.
- akcoder, on 10/12/2007, -4/+6I don't have a college degree, and I'm pulling down $68k as a Software Engineer. So don't tell me if you don't have a college degree your only option is Wal-Mart or some other crappy job.
- londoneconomist, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4@fyngyrz
The problem with your model is it fails to account for monopsony (see below for a brief definition of monopsony) power abuse, and it only examines stores as single-product markets. Stores sell a variety of goods, and rely on sales from that variety to maintain a profit. If a monopsony buyer enters the market, it will drive prices so low on a certain variety of goods, that local shops won't be able to compete, no matter what they do, and your local seller of paper towels, books, CD's, and orange juice will close ALONG with the rest of their odd goods Wal-Mart doesn't sell.
Why does this even matter?
Well, increasingly economists are measuring national welfare in a more diverse, multi-factor model, as opposed to just per-capita GDP. There is significant evidence that citizens of France, who have a much lower per-capita GDP than Americans, lead much more satisfying lives, and enjoy a much higher rank on the quality of life index. One of the measured factors in these models is local variety, as there is significant evidence that variety plays a strong positive role in quality of life, and general welfare.
Given these two things, it's reasonable to conclude that suburban communities dominated by large market chains, do not specifically provide any increases in the general quality of life, and in fact likely reduce it.
Monopsony Power is the power of the buyer. Wal-Mart is a primary example given when discussing monopsony power. Wal-Mart is so huge, and is such a large market, that sellers compete intensively for the right to sell in a Wal-Mart store. As such, Wal-Mart can essentially name their price for a good, and drive profits to essentially 0 for sellers. This is how Wal-Mart delivers such low prices. Sellers to Wal-Mart will attest to the difficult, and painful process that is working with Wal-Mart buyers. Local, small shops do not have monopsony power, and as such, cannot tell Brawny Paper Towels to drive their selling price down an extra $0.40. But, conversely, Wal-Mart will not buy a variety of goods from small suppliers that cannot meet their large distribution goals, or abusive price demands.
In the end, monopsony power is imperfect competition, and is thus inefficient, and must, like monopoly power, be regulated for the sake of consumers, unfortunately, like monopolies, it rarely is.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopsony - amonthei, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4Did Wal-Mart send out a bulletin for it's employees to start posting on here defending it's store and bury remotely negative comments?
- elShaggy, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4The lastest trend is that no one goes to wal*mart because its too Trailer Trash. I Aggree, but i have no problem wandering the aisle, stoned out of my gord, thats my only real requirement for entering a walmart.
- boxomojo, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3the cultural toll that walmart takes on communities is enough to keep me away. american towns are becoming more and more homogenous as this retail behemoth razes the corner market to make room for their 1000 car parking lot.
i'd pay more for a product at a place that not only has roots in my community, but also cares enough about it to give back to it. - born, on 10/12/2007, -4/+6From the data I have seen, WalMart has an overall impact on the US economy of lowering wages 1% while lowering prices by about 2%, which means that there is around a 1% benefit from the "WalMart Effect". Also, WalMart has a pretty dramatic effect on inflation, which it has helped curb in recent years.
From a completely rational standpoint, WalMart is good. From an emotional standpoint, however, WalMart is almost anything but. - twoashley, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4this is a rip off from the PBS site ..... http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/walmart/view/
- tool_army, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3to coasters2k:
Yes, you kinda did hear a spill from an orientation pamphlet. There's a reason for that. It's all true!
Anyway, for a business to be successful, it has to satisfy both the customers and the associates. If customers don't want your product, you go out of business. If you can't get employees to work for you, you will go out of business, unless you somehow can do everything yourself (or your family) assuming it's a single store.
The average Wal-Mart Supercenter employs about 350 associates, and some employ many more. For instance, for a new store that's opening in Norwich, NY, 2,500 people applied for the 450 jobs that were available. There was a similar situation that occured in one of the suburbs of Chicago (don't remember the name of the town, because I don't have my email here at home). It's very hard for me to believe that Wal-Mart treats its employs that badly for that many people to apply for positions at a single store.
Once again, I'm not saying that Wal-Mart is perfect or that they don't do unethical things (namely because I can't confirm or deny them), but they certainly aren't this evil force trying to provide slave labor. - rjp_wayne2018, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2so? its bad to like the company you work for enough to defend it? there are two options to take when there is a complaint about the company you work for. agree or disagree. your just mad because people that work at wal-mart are debunking the article, and you dont want to hear it
- rjp_wayne2018, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2i cant believe users are listening to journalists over actual wal-mart employees on this thread. i worked at target before wal-mart. (in college) started at target with $5.50/hr then later started at wal-mart for $7.95/hr.
Wal-mart starts you out based on previous work experience, so i got credit for having experience at Target working on sales floor, Pizza Hut as a Shift Leader, and a local grocery store.
Target started me at a flat 5.50, as they so all team members, even thought i had excellent customer service experience at my previous jobs, including hourly management - bugsy187, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1@budsstud26
Aren't you essentially arguing for slavery/wage slavery? If we strip away all bargaining power of workers in one group, other employers will follow suit to "compete". It's a race to the bottom. Shouldn't we build up, not tear down?
You mention profits and growing companies, but profits that go to management and investors (very concentrated sectors) hardly benefit working people. In terms of productivity, unionized companies are superior, according to a study done by Lisa M. Lynch of Tufts University and Sandra E. Black of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. This is a study done in 1997, and cited on page 36, Scientific American - August 1998 (News and Analysis - Economics). It's (obviously) more current than the quote you cite from 1962. http://www.sciamdigital.com/index.cfm?fa=Products.ViewIssuePreview&ARTICLEID_CHAR=63A9A6A2-4DA3-40D2-B85C-0BBF06535BE
Here's a quote from the actual study.
"...We also find that those unionized establishments that have adopted what have been called new or transformed' industrial relations practices that promote joint decision making coupled with incentive based compensation have higher productivity than other similar non-union plants maintain more traditional labor management relations have lower productivity. We also find that the higher the average educational level of production workers or the greater the proportion of non-managerial workers who use computers, the higher is plant productivity."
http://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/6120.html
You mention “globalization.” It’s a term commonly used in the business press, and a misleading one. It's implied to be the networking of commerce around the world, something rational person would accept. In practice, it's an aggressive investor rights plan that maximizes profits by whipsawing one work force against another. Profits are high, but working conditions and benefits decline for the majority. It's a misnomer, and an intentional one. It’s a plan that consolidates wealth and power. It's good for the Walton family, but bad for the poor majority.
Markets neglect the poor, according to one of the world's wealthiest men.
"A market system has not worked in terms of poor people," Warren E. Buffett said yesterday (6/26/06), in an interview taped earlier in the day for "The Charlie Rose Show" on PBS.
It's in the interest of the majority (the poor) to put ourselves on roughly equal footing with management, to protect our eroding standard of living. Unions, whatever you think of them, are the best vehicles to do this.
If you respond, please keep your comments above the belt. - mikeon, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Reminds me of a political cartoon where a guy is asked about some mega retail corp and his opinion as a consumer, then his opinion as a worker.
- budsstud26, on 10/12/2007, -11/+12@ bugsy
First, wadge isn't a word. Wage is what you were looking for.
Second, unions are a scourge upon the modern business landscape. All they do is give laborers false impressions of security and undermine the profitability (and ultimately the solvency) of the host business they attach themselves to. Any reasonable business does everything it can to avoid unions.
Benefits at wal-mart aren't much worse than any other large big-box retailer...do some research. In addition, the reason that they fight so hard to keep prices low is to pass those savings on to consumers. I read somewhere that Wal-Mart has likely kept inflation down by as much as 1% over the past 10 years. There are far more poor people shopping at Wal-Mart than working at wal-mart (at least everytime I go in there) and no one is forcing the employees to stay. Don't like it? Get another job!
That doesn't mean there's no room for improvement, but let's not throw out the baby with the bathwater. Of course smaller businesses can't compete, but what you're making the case for is higher prices. Should wal-mart charge higher prices to drive customers away and "save" the mom-and-pop stores?
Maybe you should start a business; sounds like you'd be great at it. - rokinroj, on 10/12/2007, -5/+6akcoder
"its unrealistic for people working at Wal-Mart to expect to make professional wages"
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I dont think any one expects professional wages. How about just living wages? If you are going to exploit the USA and put our own people (thier customers and future employees) out of work by buying almost exclusively from China and Central America.
Wouldn't it be a nice idea for them to at least pay enough that 75% of the employees wouldn't qualify for government assistence?
Since the tire shop, the flower store, the clothing boutique, the optomitrist, the pharmacy, the auto parts store, and the local grocery store are all out of business thanks to Walmart, don't they owe something to the community that thye just raped? - londoneconomist, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I do not understand why you're taking this so personally. I am offering my expertise on this particular matter to add to the discussion. You cannot honestly believe that efficient markets function without some regulation. If so you'd get things like JD Rockefeller using railroad discrimination to charge other oil suppliers much higher rates. Today we fight against market abuse by telcos for more broadband. Why do we have 1.5 Mb/s in the US and 100 Mb/s in Korea, Finland, Sweden, UK, etc? We fight against the entertainment industry organizations (RIAA, MPAA) as they agree to price fix in the market place. We fight against ADM as it price fixes in various markets. Markets can be, and are abused, and the government must take action to stop the abuse, or the end result is negative for society. I feel I've offered enough for this comment page, but if you have further inquiries about antitrust or regulation, I would suggest e-mailing my colleague who specializes specifically in these areas: John Solow, son of economics Nobel prize laureate Robert Solow, at john-solow (at) uiowa.edu.
Cheers. - londoneconomist, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1That's an excellent documentary, thanks for pointing it out. Especially interesting is their coverage of how Wal-Mart forced Rubbermaid out of business and then Wal-Mart's new suppliers bought up the pieces of Rubbermaid, and re-badges their inferior quality goods as Rubbermaid items.
- NaziHatinChimp, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2This article doesn't really say anything. It just displays random facts with a biased viewpoint. He never connects them or make them work to his advantage.
- captainahab, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Let's see... how could we be sure the state doesn't subsidize Wal-Mart's pay wages? Hmmmm... how about getting rid of welfare?
- lysdexic, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2I second that recommendation regarding the documentary. I haven't shopped at Wal-Mart in years, but after seeing The High Cost of Low Prices, I'll never shop there again. Maybe the almighty dollar doesn't have a conscience, but I do and I'll gladly pay more money to a company that doesn't *encourage* its employees to go on welfare.
- Protonz, on 10/12/2007, -2/+3Henry Ford decided to pay workers above market value for their labor and the middle class was born. Wal-mart is just fixing his mistake.
- fyngyrz, on 10/12/2007, -7/+8You bet it is. It simply isn't good for entrenched businesses that think they have a right to continue in business beyond their ability to compete price-wise, product-wise, and service-wise. To which I say, let the wind blow down main street, USA. We can use the space for something better anyway.
- a10webb, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2Doesn't anyone remember that story about how Wal-Mart claimed raising wages for its workers was too much of a stress on its overhead profits, but then some study found out that Wal-Mart makes more than enough of a profit margin to give their employees wages? All Wal-Mart really does is crush small business and maintain a low minimum wage.
Story is here: http://www.epi.org/content.cfm/ib223 - PCDirect, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1@Born
There are plenty of hard working people in the USA that do not have a degree and do not work for Walmart. Some of them even make good wages, some billions (Bill Gates dropped out to start Microsoft [please do not start the "other" evil company comparisons here]).
If you really think about it, there is nothing stopping ANYONE from higher education except themselves. Honestly ask yourself if you know anyone that has been barred from a higher education for reasons other than their own doing.
My girlfriend is a single mom working full time (RN) and is also a part time student working on her bachelors degree and soon will start her masters. I myself did not continue my education beyond high school. I do make more than her now, but soon she will pass me in earnings.
Saying Walmart is keeping low income people down is like saying we would all be rich without Walmart. Both are equally absurd. - TheJadedDog, on 10/12/2007, -2/+3I find this conversation interesting given that most of us presumably have enough money to access a computer and enough time to be sitting here debating this issue, how much can we really know what's it's like to HAVE to shop at Wal-Mart rather than choosing to.
Wal-Mart does good things and Wal-Mart does bad things. They keep inflation down, they improve efficiency, they provide jobs. On the flip side, many of those jobs aren't new jobs, they are simply people who were working at the store down the street that closed, they have decreased the level of quality in consumer products, they have stifled innovation, they have bankrupted their suppliers, they have kept wages artifically low throughout the economy, they have been the cause of human rights abuses in third world factories.
There is no easy answer to the question of whether Wal-Mart is good or bad for the US economy. The simple fact of the matter is that millions of Americans cannot afford to shop anywhere else and Wal-Mart offers them access to goods they wouldn't otherwise have, but then again, perhaps if Wal-Mart raised its wages (which effect wage rates everywhere, not just at Wal-Mart), people may not be in that position. - doktorziplok, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2we should also not forget the numerous news factoids about walmart's alleged "glass ceiling," labor-law violations, and refusal to sell cds/dvds that aren't "approved." as a union (cwa) employee, their anti-union attitudes are enough to keep me out of their stores. has anyone ever been to a meijers (a mega mart chain, sells everything from groceries to computers)? they are a union "shop" and prices are comparable.
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