AND your quote had a a number. Subsidizing to the tune of $153 billion/year. That cannot be true, as already explained.
I don’t know, probably a lot of different things. Behavioral economics is complex.
But in any event, you haven’t really made the argument why you think Walmart is receiving a subsidy, and I’m loathe to make it for you since it’d be strawmannirg.
I’ll do it anyways, because I wanted to make this point. The argument that says Walmart is receiving a subsidy is basically question begging. It goes something like this:
P: Walmart pays X
P: A living wage is X +Y
P: Government provides benefits in terms of a social safety net of Y
C: Therefore, Walmart is receiving a subsidy of Y.
Is that about right? If it’s not, feel free to elaborate on what argument you’re making.
But in that example, the inherent assumption is that workers have a right to some wage X+Y. They don’t. On top of that, the funding that is provided in the form of the social safety net is paid to the person, not Walmart. It’s a gigantic unsupported leap to say that Walmart is receiving the subsidy, and you can’t make it without the underlying assumption that somehow the worker is owed X+Y and is not getting it.
The worker gets what the market will bear. We as a society subsidize the people, not Walmart.
An argument that I think could be more reasonable is:
Benefit ABC increases the wage at which someone is willing to give up leisure, thus increasing wages for those who remain working and making things harder for employers
or
Benefit XYZ incentivizes entry into the workforce, thus depressing wages for folks already in the workforce and making labor cheaper for employers.
But I don’t think it appropriate to call either of these a subsidy (or…antisubsidy?). Incidentally, there is literature addressing issues like this, which we could probably dig into if there’s interest.