# Wal-Mart, et al **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [November 28, 2004, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997 "2004-11-28T15:21:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Krisfer\_the\_Cat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Krisfer\_the\_Cat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Krisfer_the_Cat)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2004, 4:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997/41 "2004-11-30T04:06:19Z")
[QUOTE=ralph124c] WALMART is indeed a paradox-they are a lousy employer, but apparently, people like tobuy from them (I always see their parking lot full). That said, I have never found their prices to be particularly great…most of the time,you can do just as well at other stores. And most of the stuff they sell isof extremely low quality…like the made-in-China shoes that fall apart after 4-5 months, or that clothing that shrinks after the first wash. I do find their ads pretty smarmy-always ranting about how much they give back to the community, and what a great career the place offers-that is bull bleep. WALMART is just another huge purveyor of cheap, low quality dreck. QUOTE] Funny thing… I still have the shoes I bought two years ago… and they are still wearable. Ditto my clothes, of course I am very carefull of HOW I launder my clothing, maybe that has something to do with it? ---
**Author:** ![davenportavenger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/5f8ce5/32.png) [@davenportavenger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davenportavenger)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2004, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997/42 "2004-11-30T04:12:34Z")
> [@ITR champion](#): > > Let’s not forget the incident in 2001 where an employee was fired for helping the local police battle child abuse. Er, cite? (Not that I don’t believe you, but I’d like to know more about this.) I agree that the color scheme is hideous. Walmarts always clash with the local architecture. I read about a Walmart in New England that complied with the town, though, and constructed an old-fashioned “Tudor” style store. It still looked kind of fugly, but not as gross as the red, white, and blue boxes. ---
**Author:** ![Happy\_Lendervedder](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/happy_lendervedder/32/8488_2.png) [@Happy\_Lendervedder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Lendervedder)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2004, 7:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997/43 "2004-11-30T07:07:41Z")
> [@milroyj](#): > > Says who, exactly? Well, technically, they don’t have to. A corporation’s only real legal responsibility is to make a profit for its shareholders. But in fact many things a corporation does to fulfil it’s legal responsibility to its shareholders could be classified as, at the very least, immoral, if not evil. And Walmart, being the largest retailer on the planet, has arguably lead the way in this. (I wish every person in America could see [_The Corporation_](http://imdb.com/title/tt0379225/).) > [@](#): > > I’m of mixed views on sweatshop labor. I’ve been to the third world, and frankly everything is sweatshop labor. It’s almost inescapable. Doesn’t mean it’s right. When Walmart tells vendors if they want to have their products on the Walmart shelves, they have to be sold at a terrifically low price, this practically forces the vendor to find obscenely cheap labor to produce its goods. This is Walmart directly endorsing sweat shops. They are the largest retailer in the world, setting its prices so low, that vendors have no alternative but to look to China for labor. As an American, I’m pissed that decent-paying factory jobs in our country are being lost. As a compassionate individual I’m pissed that people are being exploited in _any_ country (working 13-16 hours per day, seven days a week, for 13-31 cents an hour, with no health or safety regulations) so we can buy our Barbies for $15.88. But it’s easy for many of us to sit back and say “Ah this is just how corporations work. C’est la vie.” It’s not so easy when you’re a single mom trying to make ends meet on $6-$8 an hour and no benefits and no room for advancement. Or if you’re a 13-year-old Chinese girl who after working her 15th hour on her 20th straight day loses a hand in a machine. > [@](#): > > I can’t think of any company where unskilled labour equates to a ‘good’ job. (Benefits, a wage you can live on as the sole income.) I worked for five years while in college doing “unskilled labor” where I earned $12 an hour plus good benefits. This was ten years ago. Granted, it was a union position. But the “unskilled laborers” with whom I worked were able to support families. All because they had a voice (through contract negotiations) in how the money _they helped the company earn_ would be spent from year to year. > [@](#): > > Even the mom and pops that Walmart is accused of putting out of business never paid much for unskilled labour. They had/have no where _near_ the fucking resources Walmart has to provide its employees a better wage. But I think that we’re forgetting that these moms and pops are actual people too who are forced out of their livelihood by a massive morally bankrupt entity that doesn’t give a crap about any person or community it uses for its profit making. Five of the ten richest people in the world are Waltons; Walmart sucked up $8 billion in profits last year; Walmart CEO H. Lee Scott took home $4.7 million last year (his salary and bonuses were up 48% from the previous year). Surely, offering its employees a living wage and a solid benefits package would not break the family or the corporation. Pretty soon we’re going to have nothing but big box retailers putting into practice the same Walmart tactics to compete, which will outsource the jobs of the very customers they hold so dear. We’ll be left with a nation of low-paid workers and billionaire execs. But at least we’ll be able to buy Spiderman 5 for $8.12. Evil. Happy ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2004, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997/44 "2004-11-30T22:58:33Z")
Did anyone see this? [http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=509&ncid=509&e=19&u=/ap/20041130/ap\_on\_bi\_ge/wal\_mart\_union\_1](http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=509&ncid=509&e=19&u=/ap/20041130/ap_on_bi_ge/wal_mart_union_1) ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2004, 11:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997/45 "2004-11-30T23:04:08Z")
> [@Happy Lendervedder](#): > > Five of the ten richest people in the world are Waltons; Walmart sucked up $8 billion in profits last year; Walmart CEO H. Lee Scott took home $4.7 million last year (his salary and bonuses were up 48% from the previous year). Surely, offering its employees a living wage and a solid benefits package would not break the family or the corporation. > > Happy [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=5490946&postcount=166](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=5490946&postcount=166) I tried to calculate that out once. I don’t know if its true but giving an extra 5k a year to their low wage employees would increase costs by about 2% at walmart, not really a big deal IMO and i’d gladly pay the extra 2% since this particular issue really bugs me. ---
**Author:** ![manhattan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/manhattan/32/7_2.png) [@manhattan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/manhattan)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2004, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997/46 "2004-11-30T23:53:37Z")
> [@Wesley Clark](#): > > [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=5490946&postcount=166](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=5490946&postcount=166) > > I tried to calculate that out once. I don’t know if its true but giving an extra 5k a year to their low wage employees would increase costs by about 2% at walmart, not really a big deal IMO and i’d gladly pay the extra 2% since this particular issue really bugs me. So would I. But most people wouldn’t. You have to understand just how brutal retailing is – and make no mistake, Wal_Mart has caused much of the brutality. But here’s the thing. Wal_Mart’s massive, massive operating profits are actually only a tiny portion of sales – a little under 5%. That $5K multiplied by (say) a million low-wage workers (surely there must be at least 100,000 people making a good living in the IT department, running stores, etc) comes to $5 billion. 2% of sales as you say but fully 40% of their operating profits. As to people paying for it? Wal_Mart announced this summer that they were going to try to ease off the discounting just a little bit. In fairness to Wal_Mart detractors, they wanted to do this to increase profits and not as some kind of scheme to get more money to the workers. But here’s the thing – it didn’t work. The final straw actually came just this past weekend, when Wal_Mart’s Black Friday was extremely disappointing. They posted a sales increase of just .7%, whereas their competitors in the general merchandising area saw decent single-digit increases. People drove right by a Wal_Mart to hit a Target or a J.C. Penny or even a Sears or K-Mart. Wal\*Mart just announced that they are capitulating to the marketplace and resuming aggressive discounting. Hate Wal\*Mart if you want – I do. But remember that you’re equally hating the millions and millions of people who shop there. They’re not successful because they’re evil. They’re successful because they provide what customers are increasingly demanding. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2004, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997/47 "2004-12-01T00:05:29Z")
> [@ITR champion](#): > > Let’s not forget the incident in 2001 where an employee was fired for helping the local police battle child abuse. Holy shit, when was this? ---
**Author:** ![DougC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/7feea3/32.png) [@DougC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DougC)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2004, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997/48 "2004-12-01T00:31:04Z")
- - - Wal-Mart doesn’t do anything particularly wrong, for the most part. One thing they do very right is they have invested heavily in technology for monitoring and managing their supply chain. The tech stories you hear about Wal-Mart’s IT systems are simply staggering. - And anyway–their large size has already effectively emliminated them from some types of retailing: Wal-Mart demands a huge amount of merchandise be available just to them, because they have so-many-hundreds of stores–but there are lots of smaller companies that cannot supply so large a demand, and so selling at Wal-Mart is not an option for them. W-M is pounding the consumer commodities but simply can no longer compete in the niche markets. ~ ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2004, 1:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997/49 "2004-12-01T01:07:50Z")
> [@manhattan](#): > > Hate Wal\*Mart if you want – I do. But remember that you’re equally hating the millions and millions of people who shop there. They’re not successful because they’re evil. They’re successful because they provide what customers are increasingly demanding. You have a point, but I noted in that other thread that around here you can shop at Marsh or Kroger, and Kroger has a union. Their deals are also better than Marshs, even though their employees make more money. So yeah, within reason its our fault for wanting the best deal and not caring who gets hurt to get it but the fact that the service industry does have pockets of employers with unions who still survive shows that it can be done. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2004, 4:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997/50 "2004-12-01T04:38:04Z")
Around here, one of the best grocery stores, Giant Eagle, is unionized. They’re pretty big-open 24 hours, you can buy practically everything you want, nice, neat, clean, great deals, and the staff seems to be treated fairly. ---
**Author:** ![Cardinal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cardinal/32/4000_2.png) [@Cardinal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cardinal)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2004, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997/51 "2004-12-01T04:39:22Z")
> [@pepperlandgirl](#): > > Actually, Wal Mart only theoretically offers health care benefits. You have to be a full time employee to be elgible. Well, they only schedule their employees for 34 hours or less, thus they do not qualify for full-time status, and they cannot get health benefits. > > K-Mart pulled this shit too, so it’s not just a Wal-Mart thing… My cousin works as an asst mgr at Wal-Mart in Simi Valley, CA, and he was telling me just las weekend that his store manager won’t talk to people who don’t want to work full time. He said they also tell you to choose a benefits plan immediately. I have to take some of this attacking with a grain of salt. ---
**Author:** ![Chairman\_Pow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/838e76/32.png) [@Chairman\_Pow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chairman_Pow)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2004, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997/52 "2004-12-01T04:50:28Z")
> [@Happy Lendervedder](#): > > A corporation’s only real legal responsibility is to make a profit for its shareholders. You may want to rephrase this or provide a cite. True, a corporation is for the benefit of the shareholders, but I find it odd that there’d be a statue that would require this… ---
**Author:** ![Happy\_Lendervedder](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/happy_lendervedder/32/8488_2.png) [@Happy\_Lendervedder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Lendervedder)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2004, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997/53 "2004-12-01T14:42:32Z")
> [@](#): > > You may want to rephrase this or provide a cite. True, a corporation is for the benefit of the shareholders, but I find it odd that there’d be a statue that would require this… Laws vary from state to state, but laws _are_ there to protect shareholders and hold corporate officers accountable to act in the shareholders’ best interest (which would be to return a profit on their investment). Unfortunately, sometimes acting in the best interest of returning a profit means violating labor or environmental laws-- if the fines incurred actually cost them less money than obeying the law, then the corp.'ll gladly pay the fines or take whatever else the govt. slaps their wrist with. If there weren’t corporate accountability laws, then what’s to keep a corporate officer or board from spending all capital on it’s own personal interests. Remember the Tyco brouhaha a couple of years ago? The CEO and CFO were on trial for their gross mishandling of corporate funds (ended in mistrial, due to a juror claiming threats were made against him). The Michigan Supreme Court in 1919 ruled against Henry Ford, saying he was not acting in the best interest of FoMoCo’s investors by spending company money in a certain manner-- despite also agreeing that his actions were well-intentioned for the betterment of “society.” (_Dodge v. Henry Ford_) Another article about corporate law: [http://www.medialens.org/articles\_2002/rh\_corporate\_responsibility.html](http://www.medialens.org/articles_2002/rh_corporate_responsibility.html) ---
**Author:** ![Chairman\_Pow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/838e76/32.png) [@Chairman\_Pow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chairman_Pow)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2004, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997/54 "2004-12-02T00:43:27Z")
> [@Happy Lendervedder](#): > > If there weren’t corporate accountability laws, then what’s to keep a corporate officer or board from spending all capital on it’s own personal interests. Remember the Tyco brouhaha a couple of years ago? The CEO and CFO were on trial for their gross mishandling of corporate funds (ended in mistrial, due to a juror claiming threats were made against him). Obviously there are laws to protect shareholders. I understand that point, but your post lead me to believe that there was a plutocratic government mandate that Walmart screw workers or otherwise work at cross purposes. It’s not worth pursuing. ---
**Author:** ![ITR\_champion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c67d28/32.png) [@ITR\_champion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ITR_champion)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2004, 4:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997/55 "2004-12-03T04:15:33Z")
> [@continuity eror](#): > > Er, cite? (Not that I don’t believe you, but I’d like to know more about this.) I distinctly remember that we had at least one thread about it when it happened, by my searches haven’t found it yet. Maybe that thread disappeared into the black hole. Anyway, what happened is that a photoshop employee noticed a picture of a baby with bruises on his body and alerted local police, who tracked it down and found an abuse case leading to an arrest. WalMart said this was a violation of the customer’s privacy, and the guy lost his job. ---
**Author:** ![Krisfer\_the\_Cat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Krisfer\_the\_Cat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Krisfer_the_Cat)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2004, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997/56 "2004-12-03T16:21:31Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#): > > Around here, one of the best grocery stores, Giant Eagle, is unionized. They’re pretty big-open 24 hours, you can buy practically everything you want, nice, neat, clean, great deals, and the staff seems to be treated fairly. Unfortunately around here there is Walmart and a couple local stores. Oh and Albertson’s talk about expensive! The upshot for me is that if I patronize the local stores exclusively I can expect to pay twice as much money for my groceries. I can’t afford that. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2004, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997/57 "2004-12-04T01:19:06Z")
> [@Krisfer the Cat](#): > > Unfortunately around here there is Walmart and a couple local stores. Oh and Albertson’s talk about expensive! > > The upshot for me is that if I patronize the local stores exclusively I can expect to pay twice as much money for my groceries. I can’t afford that. And that’s another reason to hate the place-but I can’t blame you for shopping there. ---
**Author:** ![Chairman\_Pow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/838e76/32.png) [@Chairman\_Pow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chairman_Pow)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2004, 1:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997/58 "2004-12-04T01:22:13Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#): > > And that’s another reason to hate the place-but I can’t blame you for shopping there. Huh? Is Wal-Mart somehow driving up the price of food at the local store? ---
**Author:** ![norinew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/eb9ed0/32.png) [@norinew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/norinew)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2004, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997/59 "2004-12-04T14:04:48Z")
> [@Chairman Pow](#): > > Huh? Is Wal-Mart somehow driving up the price of food at the local store? It’s not that WalMart is responsible for driving up the price at the local store per se, _but_: WalMart has more buying power (and they’re ruthless about using it) so they can offer lower prices to begin with. Then, the local store starts losing money, because WalMart is taking their business, so they have to raise prices to make up for the loss in customers. Now, you might ask, why not fight fire with fire and _lower_ prices? Well, to do that, the local store would actually have to sell things _at a loss_. Not a smart business plan. ---
**Author:** ![Krisfer\_the\_Cat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Krisfer\_the\_Cat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Krisfer_the_Cat)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2004, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997/60 "2004-12-05T16:23:06Z")
Well the local stores were pretty expensive _before_ Wal mart got here. I don’t think it’s Wal Mart’s fault that they have more buying power and can buy at lower prices. But then I don’t understand economics any further than I can get x amount of food at Walmrt but only k amount at the other store. I don’t have the luxury to settle for k. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wal-mart-et-al/276997.md?page=4)