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- duggdowncatisad, on 04/11/2009, -27/+119WAL★MART™. Low prices. Every day.*
*Offer void in Quebec. - Daxx22, on 04/11/2009, -10/+83Next Week's Headline: Wal-mart announces the closure of the St-Hyacinthe location due to poor sales in this economic downturn...
- inactive, on 04/11/2009, -23/+94You're such a cool anti-corporate internet commenter.
- smacksaw, on 04/11/2009, -12/+66"The new agreement includes a $0.30 per hour wage increase on a yearly basis, for the next two years, for current employees.
New hires won’t be eligible for the wage increase."
That's what I love about unions. The oldest employees get all of the perks and the new ones just work to take care of the old ones...until layoff time, when the old ones NEVER lose their jobs before the newhires.
I always wait with hope to see that the employees work out a contract where they get some ownership in the company and that layoffs will happen in proportion between new and old hries if needed...things like that. But it's not about anything but greed since this is simply a scheme to enrich the current employees in a pyramid scheme on the backs of new employees. It's amazing how a corporation can exploit people, yet when people come up with a remedy to fight corporate exploitation they do the same damn thing. - inactive, on 04/11/2009, -34/+82Bye-bye, always low prices.
- dgaspard, on 04/11/2009, -16/+64I worked for wal-mart, in a distribution center. We lifted up safes, boxes of hammers, dog food and everything else you can think of. We did participate in back breaking labor. I was paid $18/hr. More if I worked in the ice cream room or nights. Wal-mart is more than fair when it comes to pay. The only thing a labor union will do is drive up prices. I'm sorry, but clerks, bag boys, and people who stock shelves do not need to make 50,000 / year.
- counterspin, on 04/10/2009, -65/+107Right on! It's a start.
- solid12345, on 04/11/2009, -8/+50As a former overnight stocker at Target, I think this is a retarded idea. I don't know about wal-mart but we were treated well, and let's be serious, what kind of benefits do you really expect for a menial job like retail sales, there is a reason most of these jobs are staffed by teenagers or semi-retired people, they are not mentally demanding nor require complex motor skills.
- Nintendesert, on 04/11/2009, -14/+52With high unemployment, there's no shortage of people willing to work without a union. I don't see this spreading.
- bonjovisucks, on 04/11/2009, -12/+48***** Walmart! They give way too many charitable contributions and provide two million people with honest jobs! Unions will put a stop to that, thank goodness!
In all seriousness, Walmart pays a better wage to part-time employees than most companies I've ever seen. How have they been able to afford doing so? Lack of unions. Just remember that unions are (part of) what brought Chrysler to its knees. - DrNemo, on 04/11/2009, -14/+47Unions destroy jobs, digg rejoices.
- solid12345, on 04/11/2009, -19/+49Slaves, ***** please, they ring up registers and throw products on the shelf, I know I worked at Target, it wasn't exactly comparable to back-breaking labor in the sun or long hours in the office programming on a computer.
- AlterLite, on 04/11/2009, -17/+46Are they somehow forced to work for WalMart? People like you who exaggerate look like idiots
- superkendall, on 04/11/2009, -15/+43What a shame for the workers. Nothing like another group of people to leech money off you other than the government.
- manstein01, on 04/11/2009, -2/+28You beat me to it. Several years ago, a store in Ontario tried to unionize, and succeeded. Bentonville simply closed the store.
- BassMastr, on 04/11/2009, -30/+53Yeah it's start to massive layoffs and increased price in goods. I guess some people like that.
- murrdpirate, on 04/11/2009, -16/+39If you don't like your job, quit and get a new one. Unions are just a way to hold a company hostage by threatening to bring the company down with mass quitting.
- inactive, on 04/11/2009, -13/+35I don't know how you treat your slaves, but I don't pay mine $8.00/hr
- haydesigner, on 04/11/2009, -0/+22@StripeyMagee: "Wal-Mart actually helps their employees file for benefits."
Yeah, because they don't provide their workers with enough themselves.
(usually by keeping the workers' hours just low enough so they are *not* considered full-time, and therefore do not get insurance coverage through Wal•Mart.) - SpinningHead, on 04/11/2009, -8/+29All the conservatives on here calling this socialism dont seem to understand that when a huge employer like Walmart does not pay enough for workers to get insured, we pay for their Medicaid. We are subsidizing Walmart's workforce.
- SpectreFire, on 04/11/2009, -4/+25Unions and corporations are just two sides of the same coin. .
- RonPauls, on 04/11/2009, -18/+39they can quit if they don't want to be there
- superkendall, on 04/11/2009, -12/+33Normal people who have experience with unions?
- iMike360, on 04/11/2009, -4/+24I work at a NoFrills in Canada and we are unionized (UFCW). I can tell you we match and beat the walmart in town on most products. And just to name a few benefits we get:
prescription drugs, eye exams, glasses, hearing aids and foot care, routine dental care benefits,
$10,000 of Life insurance and cheap tickets to Canada's Wonderland for a weekend every summer. - dgaspard, on 04/11/2009, -5/+25I said the distribution center. Not the store. The people in the store generally get paid less than the warehouse. I mean seriously, you are talking about a job anyone can do. It requires no skills, no talent and very little training. There is a huge supply of people willing and capable o f doing that job. Why should wal-mart have to pay out high salaries?
I work in southern Louisiana, we were some of the lower paid out of all of the distribution centers. Starting salary in $12.80 / hr. You should get your facts straight before making statements online. - prahareturns, on 04/11/2009, -5/+24Awesome, this is there first step to becoming a model for union benefits and prosperity, just like GM.
- MotherOfGod57, on 04/11/2009, -15/+34Am I really the only person that sees this as a bad thing? I have lost all hope in you ***** diggers.
- Richandler, on 04/11/2009, -13/+30In other news a union once again puts themselves before the company staking everyone's job at risk.
- SpinningHead, on 04/11/2009, -7/+23@bushobamabot
"so go to those businesses. no one is forcing u to go to walmart! ***** socialists hate freedom of choice!"
So you hate socialism, but love crap made by children in China. Gotcha - scottknick, on 04/11/2009, -14/+29With EFTA, this might happen right here in the U.S. Wal-Mart has been pretty good at closing or threatening to close unionized stores here, but if enough shops unionize fast enough, Wal-Mart won't have that option without seriously impacting profits.
- brettz, on 04/11/2009, -7/+22only in quebec.... the unions here have too much power
- radialturkey, on 04/11/2009, -3/+16He's not talking about working in a store; he worked in a distribution center.
- novenator, on 04/10/2009, -55/+68Maybe now they might start to be treated like human beings instead of slaves. Wal-Mart has to be the worst company in the history of the country. Scratch that, big oil and Blackwater/Haliburton are probably worse.
- murrdpirate, on 04/11/2009, -7/+20They have threatened to close because they did not believe they could stay in business with union demands. In many cases they actually did close. If they actually closed, that means the unions called their bluff and lost. Maybe Walmart isn't "threatening" but just telling it like it is.
- iisabelle, on 04/11/2009, -1/+14The Canadian economy isn't in the dire straits the US economy is. We're not the same country.
- JackSrenton, on 04/11/2009, -10/+22 I worked for Wal-Mart and they started me out above minimum wage (it was 6.75 and they started me at 7.20) and by the time I left a year later, without any promotions i was making 8.50$. For pretty mindless work! I was 18 at the time, and I thought it a pretty fair deal. The same people at big chain grocery stores don't make much more, and when they do (like my mother in law) they quickly faze them out and pay a new guy 8 dollars and hour. And then still charge about 20% more than Wal-Mart or Winco. I don't think Wal-Mart is as unfair as people seem to think. They also had a pretty sweet program that you could buy into their stocks, and even if they dropped, you got back what you paid into it or more if they went up. Didn't lose a dollar. Also, if your store made inventory numbers everyone got a decent bonus out of it. The smallest of which was around 500$. So Wal-Mart gets a bad rap about how they treat their employees.
. Now their overseas operations in China are another story. IF we are going to go after Wal-Mart, go with that. - inactive, on 04/11/2009, -22/+34it is a start in the wrong direciton.
- str1fe, on 04/11/2009, -8/+19You vastly overestimate the motivation of American Wal-Mart workers.
- inactive, on 04/11/2009, -10/+20How exactly are unions good? They were needed back in the 20s when little Johnny would get his arm cut off at the factory, but not so much now. Now all they do is protect bad workers. You have any idea how hard it is to fire someone with a union?
Warning, 2nd warning, warning with witness, written warning, 2nd written warning, then you can *try* to fire someone and just get sued for wrongful dismissal. - bitterbug, on 04/11/2009, -6/+16If someone is using salad tongs to perform a medical procedure, there's a better than even chance that they are NOT A DOCTOR.
If you're going to be crushing baby skulls at least use the right tools. Friggin' amateurs. - Toadette, on 04/11/2009, -5/+15They can quit, but where else can an unskilled worker go? Where else can they go when walmart has driven the local stores out?
- evilJaze, on 04/12/2009, -0/+9You guys above make a good point, but keep in mind that this is Quebec - no need for Medicaid (universal health care up here, eh?).
- smacksaw, on 04/11/2009, -2/+11The cheapest grocery store I have ever been at is called WinCo
http://www.wincofoods.com/history.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WinCo
No corrupt union, no corporate fat cat profiteers. EMPLOYEE-OWNED.
Their prices are amazing. Around Bellingham I am lucky to get a back of Tillamook Cheese for $2.99 on sale. Usually it's $3.99. At WinCo? It's $1.79 every day. You can go to the freaking Tillamook factory in Tillamook, OR and buy directly from them and it's more.
So to answer your question, I guess unions and corporations ***** up prices. - PeppermintPig, on 04/11/2009, -15/+24novenator: "Worst. Company. Ever."
You can choose not to work there, or buy from there. Apparently they're doing something right because they're pleasing their customers.
Blackwater subsists on government contracts. If you want to point fingers, point to the systemic problems of government which allow for all of this madness. - LordRahl72, on 04/11/2009, -3/+12WTF? A friend of my dads worked at an ACME grocery store 25 years ago for $17 an hour will full benefits. Did it cost more for a loaf of bread and a gallon of milk back then than it does now?
- inactive, on 04/11/2009, -3/+11False. A job should pay you the value you're work is worth. Not an artificial value assigned by some bureaucrat.
- RonPauls, on 04/11/2009, -14/+22"Somewhat low prices, not every day"
- PeppermintPig, on 04/11/2009, -11/+19Higher prices everyday!!! :)
- sonofabiscuit, on 04/11/2009, -1/+9Do you realize that would put nearly half a million workers out of work? What good is a union if the people don't have a job?
Think before you post ***** like that. - JackSchittt, on 04/11/2009, -2/+10So let me get this right.
They're going to get 30 cents an hour raise every year.
At least around here, most wal-mart workers are part time, working 20 hours or less per week. That's a whopping six bucks more per week pay.
Taxes take out, what, 30%? There's 1.80 gone.
And how much are union dues? If they're any more than $4.20 per week, the union workers ended up LOSING money on this deal overall.
I'm basing the numbers on my own experience. Things may be different in Quebec. But union dues were $6.50 per week at the grocery store I worked at in my teens and early 20's. And that was 10+ years ago. God knows what they are now. A deal like this would have been a noticeable net loss for me. -
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