Levi.
Those places generally don't exist anymore because WalMart put them out of business. If you'll notice I didn't say WalMart is wrong, I just don't like what they've done to small towns and to those communities. A company is entitled to do what they want if they aren't breaking the law ( which WalMart has been accused of repeatedly ) but I'm also smart enough to know that things aren't going to change. Why not? Because of the American consumer. The American consumer wants things cheaper today then they bought it yesterday. One of my friends was bitching about not being able to buy an American made shirt, ranting and raving, so I asked him whether or not he'd pay $100 for an American made Western styled shirt. His response: "hell, no, I can buy one at WalMart for $20." My response: 'you're the reason all the companies are leaving the US. No one wants to pay for American made goods.... they just want to bitch about losing jobs. The sad thing is those jobs paid better than WalMart pays and for the most part had better benefits.
Those places generally don't exist anymore because WalMart put them out of business. If you'll notice I didn't say WalMart is wrong, I just don't like what they've done to small towns and to those communities. A company is entitled to do what they want if they aren't breaking the law ( which WalMart has been accused of repeatedly ) but I'm also smart enough to know that things aren't going to change. Why not? Because of the American consumer. The American consumer wants things cheaper today then they bought it yesterday. One of my friends was bitching about not being able to buy an American made shirt, ranting and raving, so I asked him whether or not he'd pay $100 for an American made Western styled shirt. His response: "hell, no, I can buy one at WalMart for $20." My response: 'you're the reason all the companies are leaving the US. No one wants to pay for American made goods.... they just want to bitch about losing jobs. The sad thing is those jobs paid better than WalMart pays and for the most part had better benefits.
I'll quickly redirect to Borodog. I just deleted the link by mistake, but it's the last link I listed in that long post on this page.max1234 said:
Borodog:
Studies sponsored by unions and special interest retail sales groups that offer no plausible logical mechanisms for how offering goods at lower prices hurts communities in general, rather than just their competition, do not impress me.
Why don't you explain logically how offering goods at lower prices hurts communities?
WalMart is in retail sales, although they do offer a few services as well, photographic developing, pharmacy, optometric, and some automotive services (like tire replacement) generally. They usually also have a small fast food cafe. So in general WalMart actually produces almost nothing. So aside from photographic developing, pharmacy, optometric, and some automotive services, and a handful of fast food jobs, all of which clearly represent a small fraction of the services offered in any community, the only jobs that WalMart can displace are also retail sales jobs, and possibly a small number of local manufacturing or crafts jobs that are outcompeted by imported goods. Now, I don't care how you slice it, a retail sales job does not produce wealth; it only facilitates the distribution of goods. In other words, none of the retail sales jobs in a community can actually contribute to the wealth of the community except by adding value through distribution. But WalMart clearly adds more value through distribution, because you can get similar products for lower prices, which leaves more money left over to spend elsewhere. This increases the money available to spend at all of the other businesses in town, of which there are many. How do I know there are many? Because someone has to be producing the wealth that is being spent on the retail stores. If a small community is made entirely up of retail stores and local service providers this community will rapidly go broke. Where is the money coming from to shop at the retail stores and pay for the services? Money must leak out of the community as people buy cars and goods that are not manufactured there. In other words, the community damn well better be producing something of value or it is doomed anyway. Citing a bunch of studies that say that some fraction of communities do poorly after a WalMart or other big box retailer comes to town is preposterous. The big box retailers can only make communities wealthier. If some fraction of communities becomes poorer after a big box retailer comes to town, that is probably because the economy of that town is becoming obsolete, regardless of the makeup up their retial sales sector.
In fact, because the economy is always changing you will always be able to find communities whose economies are on the wane, and some fraction of these will always have a WalMart! In fact, you can easily see a correlation between WalMarts and economic downswings in communities by recognizing that economies on the downswing are the economies most in need of inexpensive retail goods, meaning that the positive impact is largest where the economy is hurting, and hence the positive increase in the lifestyle and standard of living of consumers will be largest in these communities, hence their market capture will likely be largest there. By targeting communities in economic distress, WalMart could ensure their low prices do the most good! Unfortunately that would also create a correlation between the presence of a WalMart in a community and an economic downturn that can be exploited by the disingenuous spin engines of unions and coalitions of disgruntled competitors.
All of the jobs lost due to competition are, of course, real hardships in the short run for those people. But as always, the loss of jobs due to competition frees up labor for more valuable uses. The United States has lost 300 million jobs in the last 14 years. There are only 300 million men, women, and children in the entire country! Is the country all unemployed? No. Because 320 million jobs have been created in the same time (the population has risen by about 20 million people in that time).
40% of the population used to be employed in agriculture. Now it's less than 2%. Do we have 38% unemployment? No.
We've lost an enormous number of manufacturing jobs. But so what? Manufacturing jobs generally suck. They are usually sweaty, repetitive, dangerous, and boring. They were replaced with safer jobs, more interesting jobs, better jobs, more valuable jobs.
I reiterate, WalMart and the other big box retailers, although they can be faulted for taking government handouts and sometimes using local government to steal people's land, cannot be faulted for offering consumers lower prices which makes them wealthier, and freeing up valuable labor and capital for more productive uses.
So until you can come up with a plausible logical mechanism for how less expensive goods can possibly be harmful to a community in general, all the handwaving and spin machine studies will remain unconvincing.
I reiterate, WalMart and the other big box retailers, although they can be faulted for taking government handouts and sometimes using local government to steal people's land, cannot be faulted for offering consumers lower prices which makes them wealthier, and freeing up valuable labor and capital for more productive uses.
So until you can come up with a plausible logical mechanism for how less expensive goods can possibly be harmful to a community in general, all the handwaving and spin machine studies will remain unconvincing.
If you think cutting sales commissions by 50-75% is good, then we will agree to disagree. It was interesting to see that in the Walmart Sucks blog that the one store manager got a bonus of $80,000. That is unheard of in the retail industry. Never would have guessed that.
Some of your points about the factories and production are true. The railroads really started the Industrial Revolution. Many of the workers who benefitted from the unions were European immigrants. Unions other major victory was inventing the middle class.
So until you can come up with a plausible logical mechanism for how less expensive goods can possibly be harmful to a community in general, all the handwaving and spin machine studies will remain unconvincing.
If you think cutting sales commissions by 50-75% is good, then we will agree to disagree. It was interesting to see that in the Walmart Sucks blog that the one store manager got a bonus of $80,000. That is unheard of in the retail industry. Never would have guessed that.
Some of your points about the factories and production are true. The railroads really started the Industrial Revolution. Many of the workers who benefitted from the unions were European immigrants. Unions other major victory was inventing the middle class.
Levi,
If you've run out of original thoughts or in actuallity you don't have any first hand experience with what we're discussing that's cool... all I've been typing in what I've seen and know about personally. We can both sit here and cut and paste different views all day but what's the point. GL on your finals. :toast:
If you've run out of original thoughts or in actuallity you don't have any first hand experience with what we're discussing that's cool... all I've been typing in what I've seen and know about personally. We can both sit here and cut and paste different views all day but what's the point. GL on your finals. :toast:
Levi,
Sorry for the last post remark about 'original' thoughts.... it's just that I've been around WalMart for over 30 years, seen all of the studies, pro and con, and I know what they've done to small towns. Was it inevitable even without WalMart? Probably but in actuallity we don't know since WalMart did change the landscape of retailing in the US and also the economics of small towns. Either way, it's done and can't be changed. take care....
Sorry for the last post remark about 'original' thoughts.... it's just that I've been around WalMart for over 30 years, seen all of the studies, pro and con, and I know what they've done to small towns. Was it inevitable even without WalMart? Probably but in actuallity we don't know since WalMart did change the landscape of retailing in the US and also the economics of small towns. Either way, it's done and can't be changed. take care....
I find it quite ironic that Walmart is run by (management) pigs and their stores are frequented by slobs. I will not go in those stores anymore. Within five minutes in there, I am ready to kill someone- narrow and cluttered aisles, way too many people, incompetent staff. I know it is an unfair generalization, but something about that store attracts white trash like nothing else, it can't be just the prices. The parking lot is always full.
I really don't think it is that much cheaper than Target anyways. Even if it is, I will pay the extra pennies. I guess I will pay the extra two percent to preserve my sanity.
I really don't think it is that much cheaper than Target anyways. Even if it is, I will pay the extra pennies. I guess I will pay the extra two percent to preserve my sanity.
Death Eats a Cracker said:
death, thanks for checking in. i dont know how old the universe is. i allow for the possibility that the earth is 6,000 years old...and the possibility that it is 1.4 billion years old. i dont know which is right or if its somewhere in between...i wasnt there in the beginning. plenty of people much smarter than me make a strong arguement for either case.
you seem to know how old the universe is. you must be pretty smart...do you shop at walmart?
max1234 said:
As I mentioned earlier, anecdotes aren't always the best source for information. I talked to someone who participated in the same internship that I'm going to be doing, and he said he had a horrible experience.max1234 said:
If I just listened to him, I would have missed out on a great opportunity because, according to the Princeton Review, the internship is highly ranked for its selectivity and compensation, etc.
Not saying that your personal experiences aren't worth anything, but they tend to cloud rational thoughts. Kind of like Goodlate. I bet he didn't care about gambling before his son's death, but it was such a tragic event that he went off the wall and wanted to exact revenge.
http://www.walmartmovie.com/
http://gobnf.org/i/wm/wmtv/jose.jpg
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http://gobnf.org/i/wm/wmtv/jose.jpg
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WildBill said:
Agreed agreed agreed.
The way Americans talk about 'cheap overseas labour markets' (thanks for that, Mr Dobbs) reminds me of how the protectionists/unionists talked when we (Canada) brought in the Free Trade Agreement with the States. We got our asses handed to us for a few years - there was a recession at the same time, tho - but now our economy is the best it's been in decades.
We're moving away, as a society, from manufacturing and to information, anyway. That manufacturing jobs are moving overseas is a natural reflection of a changing market. Embrace it.
Taxpayers Pay for Wal-Mart's "Low Road"
Of the many ways that Arkansas-based Wal-Mart endangers the public interest, one of the most insidious is how, by paying its workers low wages with almost no benefits, they force tens of thousands of employees to rely on state and federal public assistance programs to make ends meet.
In other words, Wal-Mart -- one of the biggest and most profitable companies in the world -- is forcing taxpayers to underwrite the costs of their business to the tune of billions of dollars.
Good Jobs First, an excellent advocacy group for "high road" development, has released a survey about how many workers and their families are forced onto Medicaid and State Children's Health Insurance Programs in different states to make up for Wal-Mart's dead-end jobs. Some disturbing results from the South:
Most disturbing of all is that Wal-Mart is driving up public assistance caseloads at the very time state lawmakers are demanding sharp cuts in these programs. For example, Tennessee's excellent TennCare program is under assault due to rising costs (in part caused by Wal-Mart and kindred companies), with proposed cuts that could strip thousands of health coverage.
And as if that isn't bad enough, an earlier report by GJF shows that state and local governments have given Wal-Mart subsidiaries over $1 billion in tax breaks and other "incentives" to set up their stores -- money the company clearly doesn't need.
So the public is paying twice -- in direct corporate welfare, and indirect costs from workers driven into poverty -- to subsidize a giant company that's swimming in profits, exploits workers, busts unions, drains community resources, exacerbates urban sprawl, violates human rights abroad, and otherwise violates the public trust.
Where's the "moral values" crowd when you need them?
http://southernstudies.org/facingsouth/2005/03/taxpayers-pay-for-wal-marts-low-road.asp
Of the many ways that Arkansas-based Wal-Mart endangers the public interest, one of the most insidious is how, by paying its workers low wages with almost no benefits, they force tens of thousands of employees to rely on state and federal public assistance programs to make ends meet.
In other words, Wal-Mart -- one of the biggest and most profitable companies in the world -- is forcing taxpayers to underwrite the costs of their business to the tune of billions of dollars.
Good Jobs First, an excellent advocacy group for "high road" development, has released a survey about how many workers and their families are forced onto Medicaid and State Children's Health Insurance Programs in different states to make up for Wal-Mart's dead-end jobs. Some disturbing results from the South:
ALABAMA: The Montgomery Advertiser found in February 2005 that families of Wal-Mart workers are the top dependents on Medicaid. 3,864 children of Wal-Mart employees depend on Medicaid for health insurance. The next highest company, McDonald's, has 1,615 employee's children on the program.
FLORIDA: In December 2004, the Tallahassee Democrat revealed that 50,000 workers and their dependents rely on Medicaid for health insurance. McDonald's was the worst culprit in the Sunshine State, with 1,792 claims filed. Wal-Mart had 756.
GEORGIA: 10,261 children of Wal-Mart workers rely on PeachCare for Kids, the state's program for low-income families, according to a February 2004 report in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
TENNESSEE: 25% of Wal-Mart workers in Tennesse are enrolled in TennCare, the state's health plan for the poor and uninsured, according to a January 2005 investigation by the Memphis Commercial Appeal. That's 9,617 employees.
WEST VIRGINIA: The Charleston Sunday Gazette-Mail revealed last December that 452 Wal-Mart workers in the state have children dependent on the State Children's Health Insurance Program, the most of any company.
(Note: this isn't just a Southern thing, of course. The survey also looks at reports out of Connecticut, Massachusetts, Washington, and Wisconsin. And I notice a story out today showing that 845 Wal-Mart employees in Iowa rely on Medicaid for health insurance.)FLORIDA: In December 2004, the Tallahassee Democrat revealed that 50,000 workers and their dependents rely on Medicaid for health insurance. McDonald's was the worst culprit in the Sunshine State, with 1,792 claims filed. Wal-Mart had 756.
GEORGIA: 10,261 children of Wal-Mart workers rely on PeachCare for Kids, the state's program for low-income families, according to a February 2004 report in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
TENNESSEE: 25% of Wal-Mart workers in Tennesse are enrolled in TennCare, the state's health plan for the poor and uninsured, according to a January 2005 investigation by the Memphis Commercial Appeal. That's 9,617 employees.
WEST VIRGINIA: The Charleston Sunday Gazette-Mail revealed last December that 452 Wal-Mart workers in the state have children dependent on the State Children's Health Insurance Program, the most of any company.
Most disturbing of all is that Wal-Mart is driving up public assistance caseloads at the very time state lawmakers are demanding sharp cuts in these programs. For example, Tennessee's excellent TennCare program is under assault due to rising costs (in part caused by Wal-Mart and kindred companies), with proposed cuts that could strip thousands of health coverage.
And as if that isn't bad enough, an earlier report by GJF shows that state and local governments have given Wal-Mart subsidiaries over $1 billion in tax breaks and other "incentives" to set up their stores -- money the company clearly doesn't need.
So the public is paying twice -- in direct corporate welfare, and indirect costs from workers driven into poverty -- to subsidize a giant company that's swimming in profits, exploits workers, busts unions, drains community resources, exacerbates urban sprawl, violates human rights abroad, and otherwise violates the public trust.
Where's the "moral values" crowd when you need them?
http://southernstudies.org/facingsouth/2005/03/taxpayers-pay-for-wal-marts-low-road.asp
The big issue is that what will 7 billion people do for a living in the information age? By definition, it means less labor is necessary as we move away more and more from manufacturing and I mean world-wide and manufacturing takes fewer and fewer people to produce the same production no matter where its produced. Nobody has ever given me that answer. No stock answer for the one-worlders and world economy and pro-capitalist crowd on that one.
