We're All Wal-Mart Shoppers Now
The national employment report issued last Wednesday showed that the private sector shed 522,000 jobs last December. This is out of a total workforce of around 140 million. Circuit City is gone. Macy's is laying off. Home Depot is laying off. Microsoft is, Google is, Harley Davidson is. So are Sears, Caterpillar (30,000), Kodak, Boeing, and Starbucks. All these companies are depriving workers of a job. Guess who isn't?
WalMart. Thus far WalMart hasn't had layoffs, despite some noise I've heard about lighter hiring at distribution centers, which would make sense as the company is trying to hold less inventory. WMT announced today same store sales were up in January, mostly from food sales.
WalMart has 1.4 million employees at its 4000 U.S. locations. These employees have one thing in common. A job. Maybe not the most rewarding job in the world, but a job nonetheless. There's a reason they call it "work." There is an upward career path there, if you want it. I know a young lady with only a high school education who earns $75,000 at WalMart. That doesn't happen at the New York Times or Time Warner. Or the SEIU.
WalMart's critics continue to argue that WalMart should increase its wages from its $10 per hour average. When the economy is at full employment, fine, argue these points, it's a problem of prosperity. In this economy, the arguments are moot. The only important fact is that WalMart employees still have jobs. They are not drawing unemployment. They are putting food on the table. In this environment, it doesn't really matter what your job is, as long as you have one.
Because of what I do for a living, I get to talk to some of the smartest people around. The smartest of these agree on one thing. This is not a recession. This is a depression, and it will probably last for at least a couple of years. I know it's kind of hard to wrap your mind around this, but then again, if I had said a year ago we would be nationalizing banks and there would be no more investment banks, I would have been called insane. Things really are that bad. A Fed governor told me at a conference recently that they can't save everyone, and he worried insurance companies are the next to fall.
Only two stocks in the Dow Jones Industrial Average were up last year. McDonalds and WalMart. Both serve the needs of people who don't have much money. Both had elitist movies made about them, vilifying them. I made a movie defending WalMart, because I just couldn't believe, with all the problems in the world, people would protest a fucking store.
In the recent sports documentary Running The Sahara the filmmakers stumble upon a 7-year old boy in the middle of the desert, completely alone, with no shelter, water, or food, sitting patiently waiting for his father to come back from a two day walk to get water. People live like that right now. Today. And we're protesting a store that would be a dream to that boy.
In September 2007, which is when I believe the economy turned south, Walmart stock started advancing for the first time in years and Target stock started declining for the first time in years. Target may be upscale, but their customers voted out of there with their feet. Now Target is laying off. WalMart works in a depression. 
Millions of people need WalMart to live the way they want to live. People are motivated primarily by self-interest, and they decide, 130 million times per week, that the best choice for them, unglamorous as it may be, is WalMart. The people protesting WalMart are not the ones who need to shop there. Yet.
Bruce Springsteen said this week he was sorry he let his new album be sold in WalMart. That would be the album for which he got upwards of a $5 million upfront guarantee from the company. Bruce cashed the check, he's the employee, not the boss. He is an ingrate for trashing the company that is enriching him. Walmart worked for the self-interest of Bruce. Why protest the fact that the company works for the 56% of our population that shops there, and the 1.4 million who work there?
Many of the people in charge of the SEIU funded anti-WalMart movement, such as the imposing Buffy Wicks, have moved on to work for Obama, who was also funded by the SEIU. In a full employment economy, fine, try and unionize WalMart through cardcheck. Just don't try and do it in a collapsing economy.
I believe Walmart is not a store, it is a highly evolved computer algorithm that drives production of goods (creating jobs) by efficiently distributing them and saving consumers money. If you look at a superstore from high above, it strikingly resembles a computer chip with inputs (supplier trucks), outputs (shopping carts), and internal processing which determines prices and quantities of goods in a constant reinforcing feedback loop. They have the most efficient retail model in the world, and ironically that model is working best when people need it most.
D&B estimates WalMart is responsible for 5 million jobs, if you combine their suppliers of goods and current employees. We need those jobs. That is 4% of our total employment. WalMart is 9% of all retail sales. We need the savings their efficiencies create, and the jobs created by making and distributing those goods.
But what about wages, China, health care and the other problems associated with WalMart? Right now those issues, though they exist, are secondary. Only jobs matter. Jobs making and selling goods people need at prices they can afford. In today's economy, only WalMart is succeeding at this. Ask Target, Macy's, Circuit City, Best Buy, or Goody's. WalMart works. And it doesn't need bailout money to do so.
BTW please note that I, your humble writer, was named "Person Of The Week" by the respected anti-WalMart group WalMart Watch for calling out the company regarding their planned wage caps. The company and their PR firm Edelman were not amused. I also withdrew my film from distribution because I thought it was too one-sided. In other words, I don't have a dog in this hunt.
But at this point, picking on WalMart is folly. We're in a depression. We can't afford the protests. Who benefits the poor more, unions or WalMart? Look back at Katrina and ask yourself who helped more people quickly and efficiently, the government or Walmart? Affordable prices, no layoffs, no bailout money, job creation. It may not be a pleasant thought for some, but given the economy one thing is for sure:
We're all WalMart shoppers now.
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I think one of the saddest aspects NOT mentioned here is the downward spiral in wages perpetuated by Wal-Mart,and encouraged by Mr Galloway. Yes,Wal-Mart employees put food on their tables,but how much? Enough to satisfy their families? God forbid that someone in the family become ill or injured.
How many American jobs are truly created by Wal-Mart? I dare say that the Chinese "economy"(i.e.;the Chinese government) has benefited more from Sam Walton's corporate(and corrupt) machinations than America and its economy has. Far more "jobs" created there than here.
The auto industry is heading in the same direction;forgetting how much of their customer base was,and is their employees,they purge the country of plants and good-paying jobs,and then bitch about lost market share and reduced vehicle sales. Those Mexicans are just lined up to buy those cars and trucks,aren't they, Rick Wagoner? I've said it before;the UAW worker who purchases a Mexican built,"American"-badged vehicle is just aiding and abetting the Big Three's agenda to purge itself of good-paying jobs in general and the UAW in particular.
Fascinating that so many people still believe that you can build an economy by cutting or holding down wages,laying off millions of working folks,outsourcing jobs,and rewarding those who most advocate and deploy this warped ideology.
YEAH THAT's the PROBLEM..
We all are being made to succumb to all of the MONOPOLIES and low handed rich and their political buddies.
What we watch, where we can shop, who we bank with, where we eat are all getting to be controlled by fewer and fewer owners, with fewer choices and less amount of giving back to the community.
I feel we are still moving toward a "Demolition Man" society. Taco Bell owns all food shops and restaurants, Wal-Mart is the only retailer, Sirius owns all programming, everything is monitored, and you get fined for speaking up.
I sure hope we begin to move away from this. Banks are not allowed to Monopolize. We start breaking up the control of our airwaves, cell sites, and news programs (200 owners 20 years ago, about 7 owners now).
There should be choice in the market and not desperation and deceit leading us into a false need to support those who would let us die on the street as soon as we spent our last dollar on whatever they had to sell.
The neo-cons, conservatives, and republicans are still trying to make money off the rest of us and make sure the rest is channeled to their buddies. I thought most of you learned that...felt that..saw that...when you voted for Obama and the other Democratic Representatives.
OBAMA needs to keep remembering that too...He doesn't need to compromise when you are CORRECT!
Moi? Shop at MalWart? I'd rather stick needles in my eyes, icepicks up my nose, and roto rooter up the kazoo as I head for my nearest Goodwill.
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You may need a ShamWow after all that.
So, you're sure that Wal-Mart does not pocket sales taxes? Based upon what? Since the aforementioned Mr. Johnston, tax columnist for the NYT, actually conducts research, I trust his facts over your suppositions. On page 99 of "Free Lunch", "Sam Walton practiced corporate socialism. . . Free land, long-term leases at below-maket rates, pocketing sales taxes, even getting workers trained at government expense were among the ways Wal-Mart took every dollar of welfare it could get. . . Back when Wal-Mart started grabbing every subsidy it could get, hardly anyone was paying attention to the issue. Formal records and news accounts are both scant, so the full scope of its taking probably will never be known." Page 103: "Subsidies help Wal-Mart to charge lower prices. So the existing department store that sells the same television set or towel, but gets no tribute, is taxed to benefit Wal-Mart. In this way do retail subsidies steal from the honest to benefit the greedy who manipulate the powers of government, thwarting the market. Corporate socialism made it possible for Wal-Mart to grab market share by undercutting the competition that did not get subsidies, while appearing to win because it was just more efficient."
Since "government subsidies" are actually taxpayers' money, I've been fleeced to support Wal-Mart before I walk into the store. Is anything there actually cheaper or are we just buying on the installment plan?
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Taking advantage of subsidies is not the same as keeping sales taxes. In this instance, I'm right. Walmart paid $25 billion in taxes last year. And they're not getting bailed out or laying off.
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Thank God I'm off the front page of the Huffpo now. You guys win, I'm pooped.
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One of the commenters said they were going to tell on me (to the Huffpo brass) for being snarky in the comments. I would like to extend a laurel and hardy apology to anyone I have offended, bored, vexed, or infected. Oh and I deleted their comment.
Ron, what about your previous post: The Economy Will Be Fine. No, I'm Being Serious.
What else are you wrong about? I wonder.
After reading some of your comments and other posts (Sarah Palin is hot) I am convince you must be part of the amoral pack that brought us these problems.
You might be slightly funny, but you really seem kind of scummy actually. I don't mean this in an ad hominem way, I am sure you and I would have a great time hanging out at a bar checking out the hot babes, but you really seem to have no moral center.
Pity.
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Boy I was REALLY wrong about that.
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What is "ad hominem scummy." And are you saying Sarah Palin isn't hot? The Huffpo misses her. She was linkbait. And I'm not even slightly funny, just highly caffeinated and comment bowling, a bad combo.
Any time you are talking about a central wage, you should not cite averages when the distribution is skewed, as it is when you talk about salaries. You should use the median wage, i.e. what the typical employee earns. I think you'll find that if you give this more honest number, you'll find it much closer to the minimum wage.
I don't think it's fair that Wal Mart gets painted as the evil company when the other giant stores are just as guilty of the practices Wal Mart is accused of, they're just not as good as Wal Mart at doing it. The problem is the consumer, who would prefer the convenience and low prices (on mostly crap) of going to a large corporation rather than craftsmanship and sustaining the local economy. Eventually, the competition goes out of business, jobs are lost, and now everyone's so poor they have to shop at Wal Mart because they can't afford anywhere else.
Your argument seems to be that we should be glad that we have Wal Mart to get us through this crisis, when in a major way, Wal Mart (and the rest of the national chains) are a very real cause. I think much of the blame also lies on the consumers, but that doesn't mean Wal Mart should be let off the hook.
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Actually, that is the median, as it would basically have to be with 1.4 million employees. In this case the mean and median are roughly the same. The Law Of Large Numbers. I don't know anyone there who makes minimum wage, and I know a lot of associates.
I'll say one thing good about WalMart:
Immediately after Hurricane Katrina, which GWBush and the Feds were a no-show for nearly a week and tens of thousands of my fellow Americans and Louisianians were drowning in attics, camped out on rooftops, and baking on the bare pavement of a flooded and broken interstate overpass, WalMart was one of the entities which came through for us in a big way.
Unlike the Feds, who had promised to stockpile quantities of bottled water, ice, and tarps nearby ahead of time, WalMart actually did it. WalMart had 18 wheelers rolling into the devastation zone before the winds died down, and was onsite distributing life-saving supplies before Bush and Brownie figured out which way to turn their road map.
Every WalMart in this region became an immediate tent-and-camper city, for weeks, and WalMart helped locals and generous churches and citizens take care of those people.
The Feds were late, unorganized, and indifferent. And in some cases, they've never stepped up three years later.
WalMart did, and for that, despite their many serious faults, I will always be grateful.
seems to me this is a prime example of why we should cut all welfare both personal and corporate and allow individual Americans and American companies decide how they will help each other. Americans are by far the most generous people on the planet, we can help each other we don't need thousands of bureaucrats to get in the way.
Well, let's take your "individualism" a bit further. Why do we need to pay taxes for a military, when we can all just defend our own homes? Spare me the "common good" argument, when I'm perfectly capable of taking care of myself and deciding what is good for me and mine. Don't need Big Gubment to tell me my bidness.
At this point all I really need to be totally self-sustaining security-wise is a couple of s h o u l d e r - fired m i s s i l e s and plenty of dog food.
I mean, if we outlawed ALL collective action, which when you get down to it, is certainly socialism if not communism, it would solve the problem of nuclear war, too. No one family or individual is going to have the resources to build a nuke, much less launch it.
Of course I'm being facetious, but do you see my point?
...which may be why you need to be on that carb diet now...
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I thought that WAS low carb! Someone's giving me bad information. Presumably you can tell I've had about 140 cups of coffee this morning. Trying to grow a kidney stone.
I'm also a Canuck, of the French variety, and we're more likely than some of our fellow countrymen and women to put our livelihoods where our mouths are from time to time.
Many years ago WalMart was set to open in a small Quebec town called Jonquiere. The employees voted to unionize. WalMart shut down the store. This is not far from extortion as, presumably, that store would have been pretty profitable being in a small town with little competition, but WalMart decided to use mafia-like scare tactics. It's a free country - WalMart could shut a store down out of spite if they want to, but don't ask me to think of this store as a blessing for those poor communities it serves. WalMart exploits the weakest elements of society, and thrives when society is at its weakest.
A few years before that, the employees of a flagship McDonalds branch on Montreal's most crowded street, in the center of the city's tourism/business/shopping district voted to unionize. McDonalds also shut that location down. It was a very symbolic move - we'd rather give up the sweetest spot on the sweetest street in Quebec's hottest city - than let you earn a couple of bucks more an hour, it said to Montrealers.
Now the eyesore is gone, and though a few crappy jobs may have disappeared at the time, I'm sure those other non-chain, boutique restaurants in the area are very glad for it.
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You sound nice. I'm not going to go commenter bowling on that one.
"Many years ago WalMart was set to open in a small Quebec town called Jonquiere. The employees voted to unionize. WalMart shut down the store."
"A few years before that, the employees of a flagship McDonalds branch on Montreal's most crowded street, in the center of the city's tourism/business/shopping district voted to unionize. McDonalds also shut that location down. It was a very symbolic move - we'd rather give up the sweetest spot on the sweetest street in Quebec's hottest city - than let you earn a couple of bucks more an hour, it said to Montrealers."
Exactly. These companies have a long-term view of their profit picture. They recognize that reaching an accommodation with unions, anywhere, is the thin end of the wedge for them. So they take a short-term loss. In the long run, they come out ahead.
I haven't shopped at Wal-Mart and don't plan to.
Now, if they get unionized I might reconsider.
But as it stands now they don't even allow union labor to build their stores let alone work in them.
Wal-Mart would probably shut down China if they heard talk of unions there.
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The Walmarts in China ARE unionized. That's why they don't have ShamWows there.
How about their suppliers are THEIR workers 'unionized'? What a frikkin crock! 'HipHipHooray for slavelabor!'
I was talking about the Walmart suppliers, but regarding the Walmart stores in China you are correct as of 11 months ago.
Here is a Wal-Mart friendly story from April 2008:
"The first Wal-Mart trade union in China was formed after the company bowed to government demands for organized labor in its stores, The New York Times reported Friday.
Wal-Mart's reluctance to allow unions, particularly in the United States where they remain banned from stores, has been a point of controversy for many years. But the government-controlled All-China Federation of Trade Unions fought for the right to create branches in the company's 60 outlets."
Of course Unions in China are a sham.
"I made a movie defending WalMart, because I just couldn't believe, with all the problems in the world, people would protest a f---ing store."
So much to say, only 250 words...
First, you shouldn't use a word in your blog that HuffPo's comment filter will reject. It makes it harder to quote you.
Now, on to the heart of the matter.
WalMart isn't "a store." It's a HUGE corporation, and it knows how to play the corporate lobbying and arm-twisting games. It's not just about employees not having union representation. It's also about the virtual monopoly that WalMart has arranged for itself in many smaller communities around the country. Almost no one can compete against its monopsonist purchasing power.
Finally, WalMart extends to its objectionable activities beyond its core business. WalMart is not content to bust unions which might represent its own workers. WalMart has contributed millions of dollars to political initiatives which aimed to undermine public schools.
Political activity by any corporation spends money they COULD pass along as savings to their customers. And low prices are the crux of your argument, yes?
My family and I are glad to live in a larger urban area, where there are choices. The only time we have stepped into a WalMart in the past 25 years is when we were in a sparsely-settled, unfamiliar location, my wife got sick, and WalMart had the only pharmacy within 20 miles.
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Are you guys really limited to 250 words? You do realize WMT not being a store is a bourbon-fueled analogy.
My point was that you minimize WalWart's political impact by calling it "a f---ing store." WalMart is "a f---ing store" the way that Microsoft is "a f---ing software company," and General Motors is "a f---ing car company."
When you get that big, it's too tempting to use your economic influence to buy political influence. Captains of industry buy politicians for one of two reasons: 1) they want to rewrite the rules of capitalism to favor their own businesses, or 2) they are ideologues who want a certain agenda pushed, and they are impatient with "one man, one vote."
I already referenced WalMart's support of state ballot measures which would weaken public schools. Off the top of my head, a second example would be the support of anti-abortion activism by the CEO pf Domino's Pizza.
I really miss anti-trust lawsuits. If WalMart were on the skids right now, we would have lawmakers shouting about how it was "too big to fail." If a company is too big to fail, it's too big, period.
I agree with your comments.
I'd like to add that WalMart is playing a part in our economic mess. By keeping wages low and by busting up small business owners, people cannot buy the products they work so hard to produce or sell. Small business owner become part of the working force--meaning there are more workers than employers.
In addition, WalMart has a history of violating environmental and labor laws.
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I just ate a sausage/onion omelette and I'm fixin' to violate some environmental laws.
Wal-Mart vs. Target vs. Walgreens vs. CostCo
OK. Let's get this straight:
1) Wal-Mart is targeting lower income and lower-middle income consumers, i.e. its employees.
2) Wal-Mart won't pay its employees a decent salary w/ benefits.
3) Wal-Mart says its same-store sales are growing more slowly than Target's is because Wal-Mart's customers earn less and have been squeezed worse by soaring fuel prices.
Sounds like one of those destructive cycles brought about by narrow-thinking from upper-management...
http://www.christiansarkar.com/2006/02/walmart_vs_target_vs_walgreens.htm
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Where else can I get my frogging gigs for my fanboat? Frogs are HUGE in a depression.
Wal-mart won't pay its employees a decent salary w/benefits
Why do you get to make that decision for other people? Clearly the people employed at Wal-Mart feel differently or else they wouldn't work there. If there next best alternative is a job that pays even less or no job at all the salary and benefits that Wal-Mart offers aren't so bad anymore.
If you do the research you will find the employees at CostCo get a far better deal. They are invested in the business and the management style emphasizes employee feedback. The president/founder of CostCo pays himself a minimal salary and keeps a small cubicle-type office. Everyone I know who has any sense shops CostCo or Target and would never set foot in a Wal-Mart.
If the economy is running well "they" shout; "You have a good life. What are you complaining/protesting about?". If the economy is running down they shout: "We can't afford this protests."
Make up your mind. Or just be honest and simply say: "Shut the f... up."
The critism of WalMart isn't simply void because the economy is tanking. On the contrary:
- people with a good security net are more willing to spend money which will boost the economy again
- if all the money goes to China (mainproducer of WalMart-products) it will train more money out of the US
We can (and should) argue about specific points but you shouldn't simply deny that there are problems about WalMart that should be solved. And as far as I can see you are half way ;)
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I also deny global warming. I'm such a pain. Call me linkbait.
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