My WalMart in a town I lived in in Michigan had a greeter who had Tourette’s Syndrome, I knew her family, so I knew of her diagnosis. It was controlled by medications, so shoppers were not greeted by the characteristics of Tourettes.
Here in NEPA this story has been all over the local news. There was a big rally yesterday at the store that was half protest over the new policy and half fundraising drive for Danny Ockenhouse. Apparently, he’s not eligible for disability in spite of being wheelchair bound. Even one of the local goobermint officials is determined to take this right up Wally World’s chain of command in hopes of getting the guy his job back.
Coincidentally, that same store had an armed shooter on the loose right before Christmas. Fun stuff.
Of course not - if he was able to find employment while sitting in a wheelchair he is obviously not disabled for purposes of receiving disability, which is being so disabled you are unable to work. Nevermind if it was a unique job or a job that no longer exists. It’s a nasty catch-22, if a disabled person finds work at all it can permanently disqualify them from aid for the disabled even if they can’t keep a job or can’t find another one after that one ends.
That rule is a lot of the reason my disabled husband doesn’t qualify for disability, either.
So even if he had to quit because his health deteriorated he’d still be SOL? That sucks.
Isn’t that the whole point of minimum wage? Could it possibly be lower?
I’m surprised Wal-Mart has kept them around as long as they have. They should have phased this charity out a long time ago. It’s a business, after all. They don’t owe charity to anyone. It’s great that they did it in the past–and that most stores still do it–but I can’t fault them for wanting to get rid of a useless employee.
I personally am not going to miss them. Seeing a smiling face? Seriously? There’s a lot of things I go to Wal-Mart for, but seeing a smiling face isn’t one of them. And I’m sure that most of these employees can be transferred to a nearby Sams Club. They always need people to check membership cards and receipts over there. There are other people taking groceries to cars, so it shouldn’t affect them.
This is Wal-Mart we’re talking about, right?
I’ve never understood the Walmart greeter. From a store that does everything they can to be low cost, having a non-essential employee(s) drives up their cost.
I’m not disputing your first two sentences & think they’d be useful at a higher end store that prides itself on customer service…but that ain’t Walmart.
I don’t shop at Walmart often; they’re not that close & I literally need to drive a couple of miles right past the Target, which universally seem cleaner & brighter, to get there. Plus there’s the fact that they seem to cater to the dregs of society (cite), much more so than Target. However, if they start wanting me to show a receipt then I will stop shopping there altogether. There was a recent receipt thread around here (which I’m too lazy to find) & in that I said if you need to check my receipt either you don’t trust your cashier to ring things up correctly (that’s a problem in your hiring/training, not mine) or you’re accusing me of stealing something & I will not shop where I’m accused of committing a crime as a matter of routine policy.
Is that your choice, or a consequence of “the debacle”?
Yes it can. There are loopholes in the minimum wage laws for things like agricultural jobs and training periods but also for people with disabilities. I doubt it applies to Wal-Mart but other large organizations like Goodwill have abused it to the point of paying disabled people much less than minimum wage but it is still legal.
Well, certainly fun if there’s footage of Danny chasing the guy up and down the aisles, while the store PA just happens to be playing Yakety Sax…
Wal-Mart greeters were intended to serve both purposes from the start. Yes, there’s the friendly aspect, but Sam Walton instituted the greeter position because he believed that having a live person at the store entrance also discouraged petty shoplifting.
Thanks for enlightening us. With this information I will start shopping double-time at Wal-Mart so they won’t lose any revenue they might have gotten from you.
I’m not going to link this because Wikipedia has no primary source, but supposedly
I’m guessing that at some point the cost-benefit equation has tipped in a direction that signals these greeters need to be doing more than just greeting. Maybe improved surveillance and loss-prevention practices.
That is a shame, but a bigger shame is that a lot of disabled people have hard time finding jobs in general. I’m guessing that for a good number of the greeters that there are other jobs that they could do at Wal-Mart or other places but have trouble finding work because companies are unwilling to make even minor concessions.
“Debacle”?
Yep, it sucks.
Having a live person at the door does help discourage shop-lifting. My employer puts elderly and work-restriction (due to injury) people on door duty. Also publishes a monthly list of “saves” by those people, meaning money that did NOT walk out the door. Most months it adds up to a couple thousand dollars. Per store. Multiplied by a couple hundred stores.
Those folks aren’t “useless” by a long shot.
We also don’t require them to load groceries. In fact, our door people aren’t allowed to leave a very small area near the door. We have other folks load groceries.
^ This.
That, and assumptions people make about the disabled. The guy in charge of our parking lot, cart collection, and outdoor safety checks is, shall we say, mentally slow. He’s actually very good at his job, but in the past people wouldn’t hire him because they assumed he just couldn’t do anything. Fact is, nothing in his job requires a genius IQ. He is quite capable at all the tasks required.
I’ve said too much already; stay out of any/all Walmarts and avoid violating probation.
Be well. Stay strong.
Yes. In many states it’s perfectly legal to pay disabled employees wages far below minimum wage. NH recently overturned a law like that, after a lot of people in the state government protested that it “only” affected 2 workers in the state. I’m glad it’s gone - sure, it might’ve only been 2 workers then, but what was to stop other employers from doing it?
Wal-Mart greeters here always check receipts, and many give you pink stickers for returns as you come in, so if that’s common across the US, the changes won’t be too big given they’ve already enacted most of them.
Last January,Walmart promised to raise the wages of its least productive category of workers.
Now a worker with less potential to increase productivity finds himself unemployed.
The higher the price of something, the lower the demand* for it. That’s Econ 101.
*Yes, I am aware that the correct term is “Quantity Demanded”, not “Demand”.
It was always a useless job IMO.
Creating “make work” jobs is the government’s job. It’s what it does. We shouldn’t ever rely on private capitalists to do that.