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Listen up, Walmart undercuts all the competition by paying the workers low wages. Unions help to prevent that. Im not saying unions are all good, they obviously are also driven by money in the form of dues and have some political ties.
However, have you ever heard of anyone being able to support a family or themselves for that matter working at walmart?They put other businesses out of business thus decreasing the overall income in areas.Walmart is a cancer. A big fish gobbleing up all the little ones. See if those prices stay low when all thats left is walmart to shop at.It seems like there is a walmart every 2miles where I live, which i dont think should be allowed.But, cities gain revenue in the form of taxes when big bussinesses like walmart move in, so they tend to turn a blind eye to the fact that they are monopolizing. Also walmart will donate to govt. funded relief projects in order to gain support,(ex.Hurricane Katrina), not because the company does it out of the goodness of their blackheart.Besides its a writeoff.
one more thing, unions also allow for a pension, decent medical coverage, make it harder for employers to fire you for any little reason,and you can retire sooner.But without a union, I suppose I can always be a greeter at walmart in my golden years.
Actually, I know lots of people who support themselves and families who work at Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart is a large corporation. It's not just the people who work as cashiers. Retail businesses don't pay the best wages to people with few skills and little experience. Really, very few industries pay well for few skills and little experience. Wal-Mart didn't donate to government funded relief projects during Hurricane Katrina, they opened stores, used their freezers to store ice to give away, used their outstanding logistics system to truck in donations. They spearheaded community drives to get those donations of food, blankets, underwear, socks, shoes, diapers and other needed items. Maybe they took a deduction at the end of the year, and maybe the thousands of us who donated to their drives did, too. I'm sorry that Wal-Mart is a business, not a charity organization. You're minimizing the political ties unions have. As a union member, would you really like your dues along with millions of other dues payers to fund the campaign against one company? Do you think the union should expend the kind of resources it has to attack one company? And one company that is not especially egregious in its industry, but is actually following the practices of Sears and the original big box stores, and is joined in those same practices by other retailers like Lowe's and Target. Should unions spend millions of dollars that could be spent helping laid-off workers, and instead use that money to try to weaken one company to the point that it can no longer fight unionization? Because that's what's happening here.
Average wage of a service worker (store clerk, bagger, etc). in 1979: $2.92 hour.
Average wage in 2009: $8.78 per hour.
I cut and paste these numbers from Uncle Sams website.
Assume 3.5% inflation for 30 years, and you end up with ($2.92 * (1.035^30)) = $8.19 an hour. By the govt's numbers, today's employee at Wal-Mart makes about the same or better as his pre-Wal-Mart brethren did 30 years ago. Tell me again how Wal-Mart has driven down wages?
look up Wal-Mart Thrives on Government Coercion, Not "Free Markets" (http://reclaimdemocracy.org/walmart/china_free_market.php - broken link)
read the article
look up Wal-Mart Thrives on Government Coercion, Not "Free Markets" (http://reclaimdemocracy.org/walmart/china_free_market.php - broken link)
read the article
Read it. Another opin piece. With a link to a union website. Or are you trying to say the unions are in the business of bashing Wal-Mart?
Ok, you are spinning in circles here. We are in a recession, a recession brought on from the Carter era. That has nothing to do with the problems Unions bring.
Good grief! Carter was elected 33 years ago, 1/3 of a century. I know everything ties together, but to blame this recession on Carter's policies is ridiculous!
Fine. Kohl's doesn't carry them. A lot of us like to try on our shoes before we buy.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MovingForward
Here's why Wal-Mart is bad for the economy, and bad for the country:
2) Wal-Mart doesn't offer health insurance to the majority of its workers. In turn, health insurance rates increase for everybody because, increasingly, American families have no health care. Remember: Wal-Mart is the biggest company in the world.
In effect, Wal-Mart is forcing a reduction in the standard of living for workers and is driving other businesses out of business. Wal-Mart is Orwellian. It is absolutely absurd that one company should have this level of leverage power over American workers and American business. It's a form of "rogue capitalism" that is destroying the American economy. We saw this with the Carnegies in the last century. It's the reason that laws against monopolies had to be passed. Too many lives were being destroyed. And then: Reagan. And then: Bush.
If people want to shop at Wal-Mart, they should know the real costs of those super-low prices: outsourced jobs and a monolithic stranglehold over American business and American lives.
Do you think any retailer pays health insurance for a lot of its employees? Specifically, do you think these "Mom and Pops" provide insurance for their employees? My educated guess is "no". Back in the heyday of Mom and Pop stores, most people did not have health insurance. It was not a business expense at the time.
What you say about Wal Mart has been said about Sears and Penney's in the past.
Your observations are based on propaganda unions have put out there in their attacks on a company that has resisted unionization.
My observations are from my perspective. Someone who has professionally researched Wal-Mart and the Global Retail Industry for over 8 years for executives and thought leaders at a Fortune top 20 Global Corporation which provides consulting services world-wide. Someone who has had access and leveraged about 10 million dollars worth of secondary research on this industry.
That said, since you've called me out; who the heck are you? Of what value is your opinion? What is your perspective based upon?
My observations are from my perspective. Someone who has professionally researched Wal-Mart and the Global Retail Industry for over 8 years for executives and thought leaders at a Fortune top 20 Global Corporation which provides consulting services world-wide. Someone who has had access and leveraged about 10 million dollars worth of secondary research on this industry.
That said, since you've called me out; who the heck are you? Of what value is your opinion? What is your perspective based upon?
Professionally researched based on what unbiased studies? The federal government study that said that in robust economies Wal-Mart actually stimulated the business of small and medium sized businesses, but in precarious economies small and medium-sized businesses were more likely to falter, for multiple reasons? Or did you base your research on the Iowa professor whose side-business is convincing small store owners that they need to consult with him on how to battle the evil empire? You professionally researched Wal-Mart for anybody and you didn't go to Wal-Mart Watch or Wake-up Wal-Mart as part of your routine research? Wow, that's some thorough research!!!
Who I am is none of your business. I don't work at Wal-Mart, I don't own Wal-Mart stock. My perspective isn't even all that pro-Wal-Mart. I think they have plenty of problems. But I think it's important to point out to the people bashing Wal-Mart that the propaganda about Wal-Mart is generated primarily by unions and persons that benefit by bashing Wal-Mart. They have an interest in putting Wal-Mart in the worst possible light possible. I'm very curious about your sources of information. Because I've tried to do very thorough research myself, and the absence of truly unbiased information on Wal-Mart is staggering considering how much the company's in the news.
Professionally researched based on what unbiased studies?
Who I am is none of your business. I don't work at Wal-Mart, I don't own Wal-Mart stock. My perspective isn't even all that pro-Wal-Mart. I think they have plenty of problems. But I think it's important to point out to the people bashing Wal-Mart that the propaganda about Wal-Mart is generated primarily by unions and persons that benefit by bashing Wal-Mart. They have an interest in putting Wal-Mart in the worst possible light possible. I'm very curious about your sources of information. Because I've tried to do very thorough research myself, and the absence of truly unbiased information on Wal-Mart is staggering considering how much the company's in the news.
I could name off a long list of sources which provide business analysis of Wal-Mart but you obviously don't know anything about (nor have paid access to) secondary research sources so that would be pointless. Look, I've already altruistically spent time defending myself against your ridiculous assertions. You have nothing of value to offer if you challenge others on their sources but provide no information about yours or why you've filled this thread with pro-Wal-Mart/anti-Union propaganda. Take a look for yourself at this thread and you'll see that the overwhelming majority of posters disagree with your opinions. You're on the wrong side of the argument regarding Wal-Mart, that's the truth. It's one thing to be anti-Union, but it's quite a leap of logic to say that anyone who sees problems with this "Wal-Mart world" of ours must be pro-Union. You've made a connection that doesn't exist for at least this poster (and I suspect most others). Lastly, the only personal benefit I can see happening by describing how Wal-Mart is harming the US and Global economies is that I'll increase awareness of the problems generated when unfettered growth of single corporate retail entity to worldwide proportions is allowed to progress too long. They are simply too big and too influential and they are in fact continuing to grow at an unprecedented pace which is not good for any of us or our children.
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