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The argument about Wal-Mart/China is a false allusion. Manufacturing was already being shifted to overseas markets before Wal-Mart became a major player, and Wal-Mart has never required any of its suppliers to go overseas. The fact of the matter is that there are numerous factors why manufacturing has globalized, and it's nothing more than common sense to realize that as manufacturing becomes a global effort, that manufacturers are going to expand their production lines where labor is cheap, and shrink their production lines where labor is expensive.
And again, Wal-Mart is just one retailer. Where's your outrage against all the other retailers?
Well you thread topic makes it seem as if the progressives were running the company and thus it wasn't doing well. The thread itself is about removing higher end items and you make the massive jump that only progressives have a high enough income to shop there.
I'm not a progressive, but I can afford to shop pretty much where I want. I would rather wander through the woods and forage than shop for anything at Walmart. Aside from the hypocrisy of a company that used to pride itself on being 100% American goods now selling mostly Chinese trinkets, I can't deal with people who shop there.
I don't want to see a few hundred teenage single moms, ex-cons or people who didn't love their country enough to even try to learn much of anything in high school. I also am not nearly rich enough to be able to buy the low quality stuff from Walmart. It costs too much money to have to buy something many times when that good falls apart. I'm guessing the people they were targeting by trying to move upscale felt that the place was below them as well.
What does all of the above have to do with 'progressives'? I have no clue. Perhaps the OP can explain things.
I read the first few pages and the last few. But here's a nice little video that looks at both sides of Wal-Mart. Warning - There is foul language in this video if you have sensitive ears.
The argument about Wal-Mart/China is a false allusion. Manufacturing was already being shifted to overseas markets before Wal-Mart became a major player, and Wal-Mart has never required any of its suppliers to go overseas. The fact of the matter is that there are numerous factors why manufacturing has globalized, and it's nothing more than common sense to realize that as manufacturing becomes a global effort, that manufacturers are going to expand their production lines where labor is cheap, and shrink their production lines where labor is expensive.
And again, Wal-Mart is just one retailer. Where's your outrage against all the other retailers?
The Wal-Mart effect: Its Chinese imports have displaced nearly 200,000 U.S. jobs
Robert E. Scott
June 25, 2007
Quote:
The manufacturing sector and its workers were hardest hit by the growth of Wal-Mart’s imports. Wal-Mart’s increased trade deficit with China eliminated 133,000 manufacturing jobs, 68% of those jobs lost from Wal-Mart’s imports. Jobs in the manufacturing sector pay higher wages and provide better benefits than most other industries, especially for workers with less than a college education.
Mr Scott has an opinion. It is an informed opinion, and I respect that. But it's also a biased opinion. The Economic Policy Institute is a liberal think-tank. Their analyses are not without an agenda.
I stand by my remarks. And, by the way, I'm a liberal. I'm just a liberal who is sick and tired of causative relationships being posited when the only evidence is statistical relationships. I don't like it when pharmaceutical companies do this. I don't like it when unions do this. I don't like it when conservatives do this. Cause and effect is quite different from statistical relationships. And critical thinking skills that understand this seem to be in short supply in the United States these days.
Not at all. I've been in management in retail and in an office environment, and I own my own business now. I understand what "taking care of those who take care of your customers" means; probably much better than you do.
Well since I have no reliable way to judge who has a better understanding of the aforementioned business concept, I'll refrain from doing exactly what you did by assuming you know better than me.
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Originally Posted by swagger
Regardless, it's a straightforward idea that you get paid for what the job you're doing is worth. Even unskilled, uneducated ditch diggers understand that. If you excel at a particular aspect of the job, you might get a bit more than your peers, or get fast tracked up the ladder, but an entry level job is an entry level job, and it will always pay entry level wages.
Why should customer service be considered unskilled, uneducated work? Personally, the reason I don't shop at places like Wal-Mart anymore is in part to the lack of genuine service, courtesy, and just the overall negative vibe I experience there. Just call it a preference and leave it at that please...
Quote:
Originally Posted by swagger
I agree. That doesn't change the fact that virtually anybody that walks in off the street can do the job. It's supply and demand, Orl. The supply of these workers is much higher than the demand for them, therefore the wage offered for the job will be low. You'll see the wage jump as soon as a college degree becomes a requirement for smiling at a customer or putting cans on a shelf.
Now this is a point I agree with you, the laws of supply and demand. BUT it rubs many people the wrong way to see what they perceive as people getting rich off the backs of the working poor. Corporate welfare, tax breaks, special interest lobby, slashing of wages and benefits, while record profits in the billions roll in.
Quote:
Originally Posted by swagger
I was a bank teller for a couple of years in my early 20s. Highest risk job at the bank. Virtually the only human contact that the customers have with the business is through the tellers. Guess what? They also have the lowest wages. Where's your outrage about the pay in that industry? Or any other? Why are you so focused on Wal*Mart?
Best of luck with that.
Good question, have you read the topic of this thread? I too have worked as a teller at BOA and the wages were pretty crappy but at least I started above $10 an hour and the benefits were not out of reach either. Why focus on Wal-Mart, well they're the biggest offender. Why go after hundreds of smaller fish when we can unite as consumers and labor and go after the big fish that all the small fish follow. Truthfully, I'm pretty sick of all greed whether it's Sears, Wal-Mart or Goldman-Sachs.
Quote:
Originally Posted by swagger
You understand that if you were somehow successful in "shutting them down," you would not be hailed by the general public as a hero, right? People would be very angry that you took away the source of their saving so much time and money. Positive changes in the retail world - such as $4 prescriptions (a Wal*Mart innovation) - would stop happening. Other stores, no longer pressured by having to compete with Wal*Mart, would begin raising their prices. No, you wouldn't be a hero. Maybe in your own mind you would, but the majority wouldn't see it that way.
Yeah, ok.
Wow, who said I was looking for any sort of recognition or heroism? Personally doing the right thing is just what should be done. I want governments and corporations to work together on this. Perhaps if Wal-Mart-Rome fell, and with it the $4 prescriptions, overall retail wages would go up and people would be able to afford the $10 or $20 generic. Better yet, on another thread we'll talk about the greed of prescription drug companies and the health care industry as well. Maybe one day we'll have cost efficient health care and we won't need Wal-Mart to swoop in a play the hero card you're accusing me of wanting.
By paying their employees so little, Walmart is increasing the entitlement roll.
Wal*Mart isn't "increasing the entitlement roll." People are responsible for their own marketability. How much money someone makes is primarily up to them - not some arbitrary company that happens to employ them.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jojajn
As far a legal; even slavery was "legal" at one point in history. Doesn't mean slavery was ever the right thing to do.
And that problem was resolved by changing the law. If you think that the laws governing business need to be changed, contact your congressional representative. Whining about what you perceive to be "wrong" on an Internet forum isn't going to do a darn thing about it.
Well you thread topic makes it seem as if the progressives were running the company and thus it wasn't doing well. The thread itself is about removing higher end items and you make the massive jump that only progressives have a high enough income to shop there.
I'm not a progressive, but I can afford to shop pretty much where I want. I would rather wander through the woods and forage than shop for anything at Walmart. Aside from the hypocrisy of a company that used to pride itself on being 100% American goods now selling mostly Chinese trinkets, I can't deal with people who shop there.
I don't want to see a few hundred teenage single moms, ex-cons or people who didn't love their country enough to even try to learn much of anything in high school. I also am not nearly rich enough to be able to buy the low quality stuff from Walmart. It costs too much money to have to buy something many times when that good falls apart. I'm guessing the people they were targeting by trying to move upscale felt that the place was below them as well.
What does all of the above have to do with 'progressives'? I have no clue. Perhaps the OP can explain things.
Someone has been swallowing the anti-Wal*Mart propaganda, that's for sure... You can tell because it's being regurgitated at projectile speed.
Wow. I'm glad that despite having a measure of wealth now I grew up wearing hand-me-downs, gardening for food, clipping coupons and never looking down my nose at people that would *sniff* shop at a store like Walmart.
Seriously, what a pack of snobs we have roaming around here making rather hateful statements about the poor.
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