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Do you think in any corporation at the level of VP or higher is going to take a pay/bonus cut based on the current market? Of course not. And where do their paychecks come from? The stores. Since sales are down and the stores carrying to much merchandise the only place (as its always been) to cut is at the employee level. And when that cut is made, someone at corporate is going to get a bonus check for beating their budget numbers. So you know most times these cuts occur near the end of a fiscal quarter.
Last sentence not true, NeilVA (the fiscal qtr idea), plans are annual, and therefore, corps only change rates once per year. I do agree with US profits down on existing stores, this was inevitable, although the deductable change of 400% (1 to 5k) is highly unusual. I think its mainly due to the fact WM got 51% insured, while Target insures about 40%, a WM cost disadvantage which dropping part-timers will alleviate.
Last sentence not true, NeilVA (the fiscal qtr idea), plans are annual, and therefore, corps only change rates once per year.
Then why do this now? Because they are in the final quarter. If they change the money going into the plan to be lower then expenses drop and thus bottom line increases. They will most likely cut hours and hire more staff at lower hours per week thus cutting this expense even lower. Which in turn increases the bottom line as this drop also effects payroll contributions. The week after Christmas further cuts will be made to again beef up the bottom line.
All this being said, I've never seen a company change its benefit package mid-year. Cutting hours has always been the norm.
Bonus plans may be annum, but payouts can be monthly, quarterly,bi-annually or annually.
Most benefit plans run 1/1 through 12/31, which means most employee insurance renewal packages get submitted this quarter. WalGreens is also doing it this quarter, also runs 1/1-12/31. My corps benefit year runs 4/1 to 3/31, so guess what, we do ours late Feb/early March.Our fiscal year ends in August. Its all about when the benefit year renews, not always in sync with how the fiscal year runs. My last corps bene year was 7/1 to 6/30, with a fiscal year ending in December.
Again, its when benefit year is ending, that changes are publicly announced, not fiscal year, nor quarterly call with analysts.
BTW, most employee increases occur with far GREATER employer cost increases, so its about not watching profits fall equal to gross expense increases, but reducing the rate of the increase born by the employer. That means, WM will not come out ahead via the actual cost change, but they are cutting their losses on the matter. Nation avg is 28% of premium is employee paid, so when you see $28 more coming out of your check, on average, employER is paying $72 more for the same period of time.
All sounds like a great case for socialized medicine to me. If the Taxpayer is going to wind up paying for the medical coverage of half of WALMARTs employees children, why should the Insurance companies be involved
Not sure where you get 1/2 the kids. WM studied it two years ago, with 51% of emps covered by them, 80% had private coverage of some kind. Now if more employers cut off spouse subsidies as they should, and pay towards only those they hired plus kids, that 80% would change.
No surprise. Wal-mart is a company that has literally built its success on nickle and diming everyone - employees, vendors and even customers (always low prices doesn't apply to every product in the store).
The unfortunate thing is that many companies have seen how successful being ruthless is and basically every company is now mimicking wal-mart's strategies which is basically screw everyone and cut costs as much as possible. If you currently make a good salary and have benefits then you better hope that your company doesn't use the wal-mart strategy because you will see yourself either fired or losing your benefits and getting lower pay.
Wal-mart thinks their strategy is successful but its not successful in everything - mainly in terms of quality of their stores. Just go to a wal-mart and then go to a costco. You'll see what I mean.
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All sounds like a great case for socialized medicine to me. If the Taxpayer is going to wind up paying for the medical coverage of half of WALMARTs employees children, why should the Insurance companies be involved
The problem with socialized medicine is the fact that there is always someone, "gaming" the system. If its not the insurance companies scamming the taxpayer then it will be the pharmaceutical companies or the doctor's unions or the medical device manufacturer etc. That's the problem with the government - its all all corrupt. Big business gives money to politicians for special privledges (contracts, regulation that favors their business etc.). Meanwhile, the politicians trade power for money. What do you think the open wall street and tea party people are protesting over? Big business and big corrupt government - both of which are working together. With that being said, what do you think you will get with socialized medicine? Yes, you will have government, "insurance" but what good is that insurance if you can't get the actual medical services you need? We will be paying for medical services upfront (through taxes) but there is no guarantee that those dollars will actually make their way down to the consumer of the medical services.
Also lets face it. The United States has the best healthcare system in the world. Only problem is that its insanely expensive. Quality comes with a price.
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Do you think in any corporation at the level of VP or higher is going to take a pay/bonus cut based on the current market? Of course not. And where do their paychecks come from? The stores. Since sales are down and the stores carrying to much merchandise the only place (as its always been) to cut is at the employee level. And when that cut is made, someone at corporate is going to get a bonus check for beating their budget numbers. So you know most times these cuts occur near the end of a fiscal quarter.
Spot on. Most of the managers are in it for the short-term to make their bonus. Usually those budget cuts backfire on them. Is it really worth saving 1$ million on the current budget if it means you will have to pay out 10$ million in the future to fix the problems caused by the 1$ million budget cut? Just ask BP about that.
No company pays more for human resources than they have to, including management. If Wal Mart could replace its top tier with competently experienced replacements who would work for half the price, they would.
Not all the greeters are qualified to be buyers. Not all the buyers are qualified to be store managers. Not all the store managers are qualified to be VPs.
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