# Walmart makes the US tax system more progressive **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 21, 2010, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/walmart-makes-the-us-tax-system-more-progressive/564901 "2010-12-21T01:41:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2010, 5:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/walmart-makes-the-us-tax-system-more-progressive/564901/21 "2010-12-21T05:57:09Z")
Do you disagree? Are you saying that we can just argue that point on first principles? And it’s quite clear at this point that you have no intention of backing up the assertion in your OP that it’s “a really silly way to run a railroad”. I think we can now assume that you can’t. ---
**Author:** ![theR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/977dab/32.png) [@theR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/theR)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2010, 1:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/walmart-makes-the-us-tax-system-more-progressive/564901/22 "2010-12-21T13:41:32Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > As far as who benefits most, that would be next to impossible to determine. Do “the wealthy” shop much at Walmart? Do they shop at other places which have to keep their prices lower due to competition from Walmart? Perhaps there could be a graduate thesis in there somewhere, but until someone does the hard research to determine what is what, I’d say we’re all just guessing. Why does it matter if the wealthy shop there? I would think the most significant way the wealthy benefit from Walmart is by owning stock, or being on the Walmart board, or otherwise being in upper management. That certainly seems like enough for the stakeholders to be happy to take government subsidies, both directly and indirectly. ---
**Author:** ![mazinger\_z](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5f9b8f/32.png) [@mazinger\_z](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mazinger_z)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2010, 2:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/walmart-makes-the-us-tax-system-more-progressive/564901/23 "2010-12-21T14:01:33Z")
> [@theR](#): > > Why does it matter if the wealthy shop there? I would think the most significant way the wealthy benefit from Walmart is by owning stock, or being on the Walmart board, or otherwise being in upper management. That certainly seems like enough for the stakeholders to be happy to take government subsidies, both directly and indirectly. It matters because owning stock and shopping at Wal-mart are two different things. Shopping allows the consumer to instantly save money and instantly fulfill his utility (i.e. garner enjoyment out of whatever the hell he was shopping for in the first place). Owning stock is a risk, first and foremost. I actually own Wal-mart stock and it has done pretty much giant dick, losing 15.89% for the year (I bought it last year, I believe). I’m also sure, from what I’ve read about Wal-mart, there isn’t a whole lot the board does. Like most large organizations, the day-to-day operations are at the discretion of the president, his staff, and the rest of division leaders (or practice heads, or whatever they’re calling themselves). I know Wal-mart is considered to be more centralized that other companies, so maybe more policy is sorted out at the top. But, for other organizations, the policy and direction are done at just about all levels and processes shake out very slowly. Since Wal-mart is publicly traded, the use of government subsidies (which it really isn’t doing, but whatever…) obviously isn’t helping its market position. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2010, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/walmart-makes-the-us-tax-system-more-progressive/564901/24 "2010-12-21T14:07:57Z")
> [@theR](#): > > Why does it matter if the wealthy shop there? I would think the most significant way the wealthy benefit from Walmart is by owning stock, or being on the Walmart board, or otherwise being in upper management. Yes, there are other ways “the wealthy” could benefit from Walmart other than by just shopping there. It’s an extremely complex question, which is why I said I thought there was a graduate thesis in there somewhere. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2010, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/walmart-makes-the-us-tax-system-more-progressive/564901/25 "2010-12-28T19:22:01Z")
The article in the OP is a bit simplistic. How many of those Wal-Mart employees are full time workers? How many have 9 kids? We do a lot of work with one of the larger national unskilled labor pools, and 90% of their employees qualify for public assistance. Lots of them are convicts or illiterate, so nobody would employ them _at all_ otherwise. ---
**Author:** ![Markxxx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5daacb/32.png) [@Markxxx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Markxxx)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2010, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/walmart-makes-the-us-tax-system-more-progressive/564901/26 "2010-12-28T19:35:54Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > …How many of those Wal-Mart employees are full time workers … I think this is an often missed point. I have been doing temp jobs for the last three years and probably have worked maybe 4 weeks out of the three years 40 hours. So you’re left to do part time jobs of less than 20 hours a week or combine jobs. Combining jobs is very hard in retail. The last place I worked put out their schedules at 8am on Saturday. So the work week was Sunday through Saturday, so you didn’t know what you were working the next week, till 8am on Saturday. Try to find another part time job when you don’t know what you’re working. Even then full time jobs are often defined as 30 hours or more per week. So you wind up with weird situations, where you are defined as full time, but to get health benefits you have to average 40 hours. So you can be “full time” and still not get benefits. That’s the problem with a lot of the articles, the definitions of jobs are so varied it’s impossible (or nearly so) to make a good guess what they mean [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/walmart-makes-the-us-tax-system-more-progressive/564901.md?page=1)