The Wal-Mart poll

Costco. $1.50 hotdog and soda.

 

I voted 'other'. I would have voted 'no' or 'never' but unfortunately there are 2 Walmarts very near where I work and I also don't tend to support 'the little guys' either. I have visited both Walmarts on occasion, while on search for a specific item. Never did purchase anything there though since they didn't have what I wanted (specific beach cruiser bike). I'm more of a Target shopper anyhow. I especially hate the Westminster Walmart/Lowes because they destroyed the 1 remaining drive-in theatre in the county (Highway 39 Drive In) that I enjoyed frequenting for the double features. http://cinematreasures.org/theater/4813/


My brother's fiancee has worked for one of those 2 Walmarts for several years now. I ask her how she can stand it, because I know she doesn't enjoy it there. Apparently the benefits and pay are just good enough for her to not want to leave, as she and my brother have an 18 month old to care for and I don't think she has faith that she can get a better job elsewhere.

 

I am in a similar situation in my area of NY. There isn't a single store in the county to buy a pair of pants.. nevermind any sort of a Dept. store. We have to travel across the river, about 15 miles to a Walmart. We used to have Ames Dept stores, but they closed down years ago,..... an early victim of the large disounters, Walmart, Kmart (when they were stronger).. Ames closed before Walmart arrived up here I believe.

Now, in what was probably the easiest opening they ever had, Walmart is opening a super center in the county... NO opposition, in fact, dismay that the opening has taken so long. In my area, there are already no options. I too prefer Target, in fact wrote them letters imploring them to open in this 'open' territory.. Not 1 reply.

Oh well....

 

I thought the poll questions were off base from the topic title. Unless I just spouted off what my favorite media outlet says, I don't have enough economic background to decide if Wal-Mart is "good" or "Bad".

I consider them not inherently evil and a good example of the free market. I disagree that the employees of wal mart would have higher paying jobs if wal mart didn't exist. What a specious statement.

Anyway, I like Jack 06's point of view. I shop at Wal-mart because it is cleaner and friendlier than the "other" retailer in my town called K-Mart.

 

I'd rather pay a little more at the cash register, to buy a quality product that will last from a company that pays its employees enough for them to pay taxes themselves and contribute to their own health care expenses. Why pay a slightly lower price sometimes on a piece of crap that falls apart right away only to end up getting stuck paying high taxes to cover the social services and expensive emergency-room-visits-instead-of-doctors-appointments-because-of-no-health-insurance needed by the employees working for that company, all while turning one's own town into a giant slum? Shopping at Sprawl*Mart makes little sense in the long run.

 

This poll raises sticky questions. The hubby and I are Americans and therefore are consumers. We support the free enterprise system but realize that Capitalism, while it has a brain, has no morals.

The only thing driving our modern free market system is the question, will this make a profit?
If the answer is yes, then the outcome justifies the means. Use slave-labor in China to produce products, put cheap crap on the shelves, advertise as an All-American company, don't offer employees proper benefits but encourage them to use the state's health programs. If the profit margin increases, all is well.

If a company's management does not posess a moral compass, then the company, like WalMart, falls into a business never-ever land. Profitable, sucessful, hollow.

Controls other than management could kick in. Stock holders can organize and make changes. Consumers, after learning of foul play from a free media, might boycott the business. Governments can pass and enforce regulations that tell companies where the boundaries are. Or the workers can unionize.

Dan and I do what we can to keep our free enterprise system on track. We make donations to National Public Radio in a gesture to encourage a free press, try to keep up with the news, shop locally, don't spend our money on goods we know to be tainted, and avoid investing in companies whose management lack compasses. We write letters to our Reps and the local papers to express our views, always vote, turn up at town meetings.

I can't remember when we last stepped into a Wally Land. Maybe three years ago? Target has a more shopper-friendly environment but I haven't shopped there in a long while either.

If all men were angels, we wouldn't need laws. Was it Jefferson or Adams who said something like that?

 

Well said!! As a former employee of Walmart I could tell you about many illegal labor practices they have. but I'd be typing for days. It was the absolute worst place I ever worked. I wish Walmart would go out of business.

 

When I worked for Wmart in 1990 they only paid a paltry $5.15/hr. AND their FT workweek was only 32-34 hrs. I was there 3 months. Thankfully, they laid me off after the Christmas season.

 

It's amusing to see all the wildly different opinions roll in.
Of course *all* the retailers large and small are getting a steady
stream of landfill fodder from China, so an interesting thing to
explore would be working conditions of people there specifically
producing stuff for wmart vs. any other supply stream. It does seem
that on the local side, wmart is just the biggest, ugliest gorilla.
.
I made some very telling observations on my off-beaten-track wander
down south. Almost every podunk little town we went through --
every failed coal-town in kentucky, every little knot of that
"civilization" that exists only by the fact that it's near an
interstate, etc ... seemed to have a big, shiny walmart right in
the middle. We were going "aiieeee! there's *another* one" every
time we pulled over for supplies or sleep. From my little northeast
perspective where there maybe aren't quite as many of them dotting
the landscape, seeing that kind of saturation was a real eye-opener.
And they certainly haven't helped any of those people in the tin
shacks all along the mountain valley roads, barely scraping out
an existence.
.
The bigger issue, I suppose, is that when China decides they've had
enough of us and pinches off the stream, we are SO hosed. *This* is
the "american way" and free enterprise?! They *own* us. Turn over
almost any household object you've bought recently for proof.
.
_H*

 

Actually, Target has quite a lengthy history of being a fairly good corporate citizen. They are, to me, what proves Wal-Mart doesn't 'need' to behave as they do.

 

Read harder.

 

And you believe EVERYTHING you read???? You don't know the whole story.

Andy

 

The other stores aren't any different. It's the media and negativity of societal attitudese that are giving Wal-Mart a bad name which isn't deserved. They aren't any worse than any of the other big box stores, malls, and fast food chains that many of you patronize. Wal-Mart is a good corporate citizen. They help a lot of mom and pop stores with Sam's Club volume discounts. The majority of Wal-Mart associates work full time, a percentage well above the 20 percent to 40 percent in other retail business. Nationwide, hourly wages for full-time associates average $9.68 per hour, about double the minimum wage.

Health care with Wal-Mart is like that provided most businesses and it has to be paid for. Some associates decide they can’t afford it, as is the case in other businesses. They gamble that they will not get sick and that if they do, an emergency room will take care of them.

Nobody can make a basic case against Wal-Mart for anything except having gotten huge and, as such, becoming a threateningly large opponent in the market. It is true Wal-Mart disrupts retailing in some smaller communities, but should Wal-Mart be blamed for that? In most of those towns, the public is happy when Wal-Mart comes. The very success of the stores proves it. Free-market preference is what puts competitors out of business, not the arrival of the stores themselves. If they were unpopular, they would fail.

Wal-Mart does a lot of good as well. They are donating over $35 million the next decade to a new conservation effort by the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation. The program created by Wal-Mart and the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, called Acres for America, intends to acquire 138,000 acres eventually using Wal-Mart's gift, as much land as the company projects that its American stores, parking lots and supply centers will occupy in 10 years.

Sorry, but I just can't follow the liberal masses and bash Wal-Mart.

Andy

 

Wow, what an ungrateful employee. Was someone putting a gun to your head to work this job?

Andy

 

Simple untruth.

Do some serious research on this and you should learn some interesting things. I really hate to see Target lumped in with Wal-Mart. They aren't perfect saints, but they are 1,000% better than Wal-Mart.

Just because you don't like the group currently doing the 'bashing,' doesn't mean that their facts are incorrect, DOES IT?

 

On closer inspection, Andy, I have concluded that you are a Wal-Mart shill of some sort. Of course, if they are so great, this shouldn't be construed as an insult of any kind! Actually, it must be a compliment, right? You're welcome!

 

I'm not sure what group you are referring, but the facts in the documentary are inaccurate.

Andy

 

Thank you. I'm proud of Wal-Mart and that my city of 90,000 will soon have 3 Super-Centers. They haven't put anyone out of business and business is definitely booming here. We have the lowest unemployment rate in the country.

I don't work for Wal-Mart and have never worked for Wal-Mart. I will admit that several of the Wal-Mart heirs do live in my city, but that point is irrelevant. I'm just mentioning in case anyone notices this fact. I see firsthand more than most the good this company does and will not participate in this bashing. It simply isn't deserved and they don't deserve this kind of attention. And yes, I shop at Target as well.

Andy