Wal-Mart's Desperate War Against Unionization

The nation's biggest private employer is also its most notorious union-hater.  The Wall Street Journal reported that Wal-Mart has been swaying workers from voting Democrat this November, fearing that the Democrats' proposed Employee Free Choice Act would make unionizing possible in Wal-Mart stores.

In an act that reeks of desperation, the mega retailer has been holding "mandatory" meetings for thousands of store managers and department heads, scaring their employees by stressing the "downsides" of unionization.  

From the WSJ:

"According to about a dozen Wal-Mart employees who attended such meetings in seven states, Wal-Mart executives claim that employees at unionized stores would have to pay hefty union dues while getting nothing in return, and may have to go on strike without compensation. Also, unionization could mean fewer jobs as labor costs rise."

The Employee Free Choice Act that Wal-Mart so adamantly opposes would enable labor groups to organize with a "card check" system instead of the current single secret-ballot election that is prone to anti-union protests from Wal-Mart corporate.  Barack Obama co-sponsored EFCA, and not surprisingly, John McCain opposed it. 

While it's illegal for Wal-Mart to tell workers who to vote for, the WSJ claimed that employees said Wal-Mart's human recources managers told them that "voting for Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Barack Obama would be tantamount to inviting unions in." 

While the WSJ report is certainly stunning, it's by no means a shocker.  Wal-Mart's anti-union track record has been appalling for years.  They spend millions flying in their "rapid response teams" on private jets from their Bentonville, AK headquarters just to quash any suspected union activity.  And when employees are actually successful in unionizing, the company treats that department (or entire store) like a cancerous tumor and has it excised.

Wal-Mart's latest stunt just proves unionization is their worst nightmare.  It would mean they would have to pay workers wages that aren't below the poverty line.  It would mean they would have to provide workers with adequate health care coverage.  Hell, it would mean they would have to treat their workers with fairness and decency for a change.

And as to Wal-Mart scaring workers into believing that if Democrats win in November, they will lose, I ask this: if you're a Wal-Mart employee who's making a meager hourly wage that doesn't even cover the cost of food for your family or doctors' visits for your children, haven't you lost already?

Comments

[rshrink]

It has been reported in the past that Walmart employees wages are so low that they often rely on food stamps, medicaid and other charities to survive. That means that taxpayers and charities subsidize Walmart, so that they can supposedly provide lower prices. It was also reported that they have used immigrant workers for night cleaning. It is well known that they have operations in China which exploit workers, who work for a dollar a day and live in substandard housing near the factories. Walmart is perhaps the company that is most responsible for the trade deficit. They have raw goods sent to China and then send back a finished product. The cost each time is in the billions of dollars. China now holds a large chunk of our debt that we spent on fighting the war in Iraq. I don't think Sam Walton had this in mind when he built a chain of stores which touted selling of American products. In my city, the commisioners tried to prevent Walmart from building a second store in order to continue to support local businesses. Walmart threatened to sue and eventually the city caved to the bullying tactics. Does this sound like the kind of company we want to support?

[RightWingMarine]

How can a worker be exploited? The employer makes an offer to pay at a specific rate for labor. An employee agrees to this wage and goes to work. Would the laborers in China really be better off if we forced Wal Mart into shutting down it's China operations? Now they have no job at all. Clearly the workers value this job more than the alternative. Why is it WalMarts responsibility to provide housing to their employees? Why is having a home near the factory bad? I live less than 2 miles from my employer, should I demand they buy me a better home farther away?

The store can only succeed if shoppers go there. Shoppers will only go there if they value what the store sells more than what they value what WalMart's competitors sell. Why should the city get to determine where I shop? Am I not able to make that decision myself? Should they tell me what I can and can't eat too? (Actually they do, trans fats are being banned all over).

Lastly, if I own some land and I want to build a store on it why can't I? Why should the city get to have a say in what kind of store I can build? Why not let the shoppers decide if I have a good store and location?

[therealredstateblues]

The typical (and predictable) right wing response.

First off Walmart may be one of the very choices of employers in many towns. Since they pushed so much production offshore, there are fewer and fewer good paying factory jobs available. Walmart also drives out the local business and small mom and pop businesses as well, leaving people with few employment choices. Isn't small business supposed to be the back bone of the economy as so many righties like to say? Under such conditions its easy for oppressive and exploitive management conditions to exist when there are few employment alternatives, lack of union representation and people fear for there jobs and are illegal influenced on their voting.

This is very true in my typical midwestern town - once an industrial power house and home of many innovations, what little industry is left is a shadow of what it once was. The only new jobs that have come to town are big box retail and chain resturant jobs.

As far as Walmart locations - they bully and bribe and threaten legal action to towns to get what they want - and generous tax abatements and infreastructure improvements the local businesss do not get again hardly a fair of truly "free" market competitive situation

[RightWingMarine]

There are numerous posts on this claiming that Wal Mart doesn't pay it's employees enough and that the big wigs should be held accountable. Hillary Clinton once proudly served on the board of Wal Mart. I wonder how she felt about the employee pay then.

[rshrink]

Honorable Marine, I think you can understand that it is the case, that those who are working on trying to change things in a manner which has hope of succeeding, must be willing to work with many organizations and companies which will have a different perspective on how things are and what constitutes a solution. It is a good idea to be on boards if you are allowed to be, to introduce ones own perspective where possible. I don't need to defend Hillary and I am not even sure of what her motives were, but what I am pointing out is that we will be better off with more information. We are usually not making progress if we jump to conclusions.

[Sundialsvc4]

Face it: if you can't succeed as a union shop, then there's something wrong with your business model, and the unions are not to-blame for that.

You have no business employing people if you can't afford to pay them... both in wages and in insurance. If "the best that you can do" is to sponge off those people and leave them much worse than they already are, then you are either lying... or failing... or both.

I'd say "both." I'd say that other retailers are fast beginning to wash your plow for you.

[Chavez08]

It's not just Walmart at war with organized labor, the entire mainstream media is a willing propaganda tool for them. You're fighting at least 50 channels on your TV set.

If the labor groups were smart, they would push for/sponsor more labor history and corporate abuse anecdotes education in media. I see so many documentaries celebrating Wal Mart and other giants who exploit slave labor and using terms like "productivity", "efficiency", "competition" as a way to justify slavery and consolidation of wealth.

Many people who (currently) still have purchasing power have no idea that strong labor unions and New Deal programs GAVE them what they have. They think that because they are white collar, they won't be touched (they obviously aren't paying attention)

The conversation needs to be steered in a new direction. We are fighting slavery, we need to start acting like it.

[MajorKong]

Note to Corporate America: people who don't make any money can't afford to buy your stuff.

[therealredstateblues]

Where are the Henry Fords of the world? business leaders who understood demand side economics?

[rwt1138]

Dead. Buried. Now all we have are supply-side economists. Note that everything we ever attempt to control, we attempt to control at the supply. Illegal immigrants? don't deter employers from providing them with incentives, vainly attempt to seal the border. Drugs? Don't reduce demand, exfoliate fields in South America and vainly attempt to cut off the supply.

For some reason, supply-side economics is still treated as a legitimate theory. If economics was driven by supply, the buggy whip industry would still be going strong. A basic law of economics that seems to be lost on supply-siders: If there is someone willing to pay for a product or service, no matter how ridiculous, illegal or outlandish, someone will supply it. Demand drives economies, not supply.

The problem with supporting demand is that it requires you to provide a standard of living among the masses that allows them to afford more goods and services, thus increasing the demand. This, in turn, reduces the amount of wealth available for the rich to accumulate. On the other hand, if you decide that economics is really driven by supply, it makes much more sense to ensure that the rich stay rich so that they can continue to supply large amounts of goods and services, regardless of whether or not there is anyone to actually purchase them.

To a supply sider, if a product is manufactured but there is no consumer there to purchase it, it still makes a profit.

[RobtBrock]

I hate Wal-Mart: they once claimed to sell American-made goods; turns out they are a Chinese outlet store.

[FreeThinkn1]

The Wal-Mart employees in China are unionized, so why do they not want their American associates to organized?

[Rog49Thomas]

I'll bet out of some very strong altruistic motive (=profits) they like to spare their "associates" the dangers of socialism that unions represent.

[FreeThinkn1]

Unions are bad. They did away with things like child labor, being forced to pay your employer for food and lodging, and working 12 hour days seven days a week without breaks. Those were some good times. Let"s go back to when your employer could literally work you to death. I agree. Unions are bad for indentured servitude. ;-)

[TrainChaser]

Wal-Mart closes down the stores where the employees vote to go union?
Hmmmm.....
So, if all the employees (or at least a majority) in all their stores voted to go union, the Wal-Mart chain would cease to exist?
GO EMPLOYEES!

[joebiz]

This will be an unpopular post.

As a former union member, son of a card carrying Ironworker, family member and friend of countless union "Brothers and Sisters," Wal-Mart should not be unionized.

Unions are required and needed in a lot of industries and business models, even when the union members are sub-par in their support of larger societal goals or their activities create a "tragedy of the commons" scenario (think of the burnt-out teacher that doesn"t teach and the kids get passed on to another burnt-out teacher or the corrupt union cop who is beating up on innocent "suspects" violating constitutional rights but is shielded by the police union syndicates or the inflated prices charged by unions contractors on public works whose projects are not any better or safer because they were union made).

By allowing to Wal-Mart to unionize, the people that are typically employed by Wal-Mart: the poor, less educated, and less affluent members of society, single moms, second jobbers, and retirees among others, will see access to those positions shrink. It would be more difficult to get hired and be employed. And., food prices will rise for the employees. A Wal-Mart loaf of bread goes for $0.98 where in a union employee store may sell for upwards of $1.90 or more. Now, the working class shoppers that aren"t union, the unemployed, underemployed or work in the underground economy will not be able to absorb the price increases.

[therealredstateblues]

I am not buying it one bit.

People in retail jobs "back in my day" were paid very well in inflation adjusted dollars.

You are using the straw man of the bad apple union member trouble maker to paint all retail workers as such - which is definitely not the case. Most of these folks are like I once was - simply people trying to do their jobs and earn a decent living - which you could do on unionized store pay. Are yous uggesting that the hardworking people of walmart do not deserve to earn a decent wage and have at least minimal benefits - because they are not college educated, or are underemployed, or a single parent? gimme a break.

Also the scare stories of coubel and triple the costs of bread for example are bogus - the wall street journal no less showed in a recent article the effect of raised minimum wages amounted to pennies at the check stand, not dollars.

Bottom line is these stores need people to stock the shelves, and run thge place - there will not be any reduction in the demand for labor. these workers have everything to gain by unionising - better pay and benefits and fairer treatment from amangement would be the biggest

[Chavez08]

[Continued]

- Another guy lost all the skin from his legs because the skid-steer carrying molten metal he was driving ran over debris and bounced.

The job paid $7 an hour, no OT pay and no bennies. The shifts ran 7 days (5x12, 2x10) between April and November in 1990. Breaks were 10 minutes every 4 hours, 20 minute lunch.

When organizers came around, the owner threatened to turn off the lights.

Many guys that worked there over 2 years developed some kind of nerve disorders, mostly caused by a metals cleaning chemical they came in contact with having no breathing filters. ( the company would dispose of this chemical after use (between midnight and 2am) by dumping it in a river local people would fish from)

Trust me, - you were truly blessed to have a union.

[Chavez08]

I too worked for a steel plant (recycled), though it was NON union. Let me give you a little insight as to what you were missing:

- In 1990, 3 workers (out of 250) lost their limbs because over-anxious supervisors didn't check machines before they re-started conveyors

- Drunken loader driver buried a fellow worker in a pit filled with molten metal (hand-digging the 10 foot deep pit was a form of degrading punishment for perceived lack of productivity)

- 4 men over 6 years lost an eye because their working conditions deterred safety glasses though metal debris would fly from every direction.

- A man fell from a 30 foot platform onto concrete, crippled himself because the company was too cheap to install handrails. OSHA took **2 MONTHS** to investigate, giving the owner/robber-baron plenty of time to install handrails and scuff them up to make them look old.

[Continued....]

[jqcitizen]

"IF WAL-MART DOESN'T HAVE IT, YOU DON'T NEED IT'

That is a real good ad.

In early May I was in a Wal-Mart store. Was going to buy a new flag to replace the faded one at my home, in commemoration of Memorial Day. All in that store were made in Communist China!

Wal-Mart had it. But, I didn't want it, or anything else in that place.

Of all the 'knock-off' products coming out of China, an American flag should be the last any respectable business would allow in their store.

It is hardly a surprise to hear that Wal-Mart is against organized labor.

[therealredstateblues]

HuffPost's Pick

Back in the 80's I worked in a union supermarket. In 1980's dollars we made 8-9 bucks an hour with full benefits - health, dental, optical, paid vacation, sick time, personal days and so on. the medical coverage had no deductibles or co pays. 8-9 bucks an hour in 1985 would be the equivalent of 18-20 bucks an hour today. We made time and a half for overtime and sundays, and double time on holidays. Specialty depts like meat, deli and produce made even more per hour and night stockers got a 50 cents and hour night rate bonus. All these benefits were well worth the 15 buck a month dues we paid. These were good jobs - especially for a guy going to school

while I would never have gotten rich working at the store, I never lacked for food, drove a decent vehicle, bought my first modest house and still had some money left over to put myself thru college part time.

Retail workers deserve to be paid well - it is physically demanding work - on your feet for hours, heavy lifting, crazy hours, working every weekend and holiday because these were the busy times, not to mention dealing with rude and dificult customers. Today's retail workers continue to make the same rates of 8 bucks an hour in todays dollars (inflation adjusts to what minum wage was in the 80's) with little to no benefits - if there was ever a case to be made for

[VOTER]

How many remember some of the earliest television ads for Wal-Mart?

One showed a Wal-Mart semi truck being driven down MAIN STREET of an American town
with the a voice stating, Wal-Mart is good for Americans and small town businesses.

Another one touted how Wal-Mart sold MADE IN AMERICA GOODS. Flags flying .................

Well, most small American towns have lost their local businesses since Wal-Mart came to their area.

Wal-Mart imports over 90% of their goods from China.

Wal-Mart underpays their employees and then instructs them on how to do the paperwork for food stamps, free healthcare, etc.. Is this still happening?

Wal-Mart teenage baggers along the US/Mexico border got no pay at all.
Signs were posted telling Wal-Mart shoppers these young people lived on TIPS. Is this still going on?

Perhaps we should go to Wal-Mart, wearing our OBAMA FOR PRESIDENT t-shirts as
a sign of support for those working for this CORPORATE LOSER.

We can remind them, that while they can't utter Obama's name or put Obama For President
Bumper Stickers on their cars, their votes are PRIVATE AND PERSONAL and NOT OWNED BY WAL-MART.

[NeoLiberal]

The ultimate question:

Why does Wal-Mart not want unions? Because they KNOW that they are not providing a living wage for their employees.

There are many systems available to humans so that they can function as a society with reasonable success: laissez-faire, market, socialism, communism, etc. These are economic systems that are used to allow its citizens to provide for themselves, to provide life necessities such as food, clothing, water, shelter, health care, etc. without a completely anarchical devolution of society.

The chosen system has benefits and detriments. For our system in the USA, some of the benefits are profit and individual choice.

When participants in the system choose to focus on the reward (profit) rather than the primary function (survival of the participants), the system will ultimately fail, for it's consuming the resource on which it relies to create the reward.

Get it?

Now wake up, America.

[mosh]

well said. The wealthy need a thriving middle class to keep them prosperous. Who else is gonna buy all their crap? Overwhelming greed is very shortsighted.

[james809]

Ask the 3ed class citizen in China how socialism benefits him or her. Hard to believe so many Floridians are not crossing ocean waters to Cuba for their reasonable sucess. I wonder why union labor force has declined from 18% down to 9% in the last 30 years while our GDP has increased. Bottom line is that most companies Airlines, Automakers, etc have declined productivity. Maybe if you are a hard worker and develope a work history you will make a better wage. Look how well the unions function in Municipal government. Looks to me that America has become awake and decided that it does not like unions!!

[MajorKong]

The GDP increasing has very little correlation to the living standards of the average person in the country. In most cases it just means the extra wealth is being pooled at the top %1.

That 3rd class citizen in China is probably working the manufacturing job that you or one of your relatives used to get paid $20/hour for.

And there's a lot of hard working people with good work histories that are out of jobs because the work moved overseas to take advantage of slave wages. Come to Ohio and you can meet some of them. I can't wait for you to tell them to their face how their problems all stem from a lack of work ethic.

[Rog49Thomas]

In comparing countries' living standards, it's probably more appropriate to ask about the level of natural resources and the level of development than the social system.

For example, the Philippines is by all accounts a capitalist society. And its lower classes lead very tough lives. And many of its educated emigrate overseas for a better life - including people with college degrees/specialization who work overseas in fairly low level positions because they have a better life. You really don't have to drive very far off Edsa to see people living in truly heart rending conditions.

Haiti is I believe also a proud member of the capitalist world.

[Rog49Thomas]

It's quite fashionable to blame unions for the problems of certain industries.

Let's look at the US domestic automobile industry.
The fundamental problem of the industry was that it got fat and complacent and was designing cars that in general were not wanted. That wasn't the UAW. It was also the management of the auto firms that decided to cut corners on quality of materials and features offered.

When the hot wind of competition in the form of foreign cars entered the market, the domestic firms began losing market share. In an highly capital intensive business like autos there is high operating leverage (fixed costs). When volumes decline, the impact on profits is dramatic.

As to benefits given to workers. Much of the impetus for the pension and health benefits came from management. Why? To deflect immediate pay raises. Those hit the bottom line right away. The benefits were initially funded on a pay as you go basis. And it was apparently felt that the future burdens would be taken care of by the capitalist equivalent of the Tooth Fairy.

That is not to say that unions didn't contribute to the problem, but management is also responsible. Both parties made their assumptions based on projecting the then current position of the US auto firms out into the future unchanged.

[NeoLiberal]

It begs the question:

What does Wal-Mart have against their workers grouping themselves together?

Answer: having to pay them a real living wage for the many = lower profits for the few.

There are many ways for systems to provide services for its citizens: laissez-faire, market economy, socialism, communism, etc. The foundation of all these is the provision of survival systems--food, clothing, health care, shelter, etc. When we move away from the primary function of the system in favor of the tangential benefit of profit, then we lose focus and ultimately consume the human resource for the sake of the reward that the chosen system provides. Economics 101 people...

Perhaps Wal-Mart and its minions (and other free market believers) should remember that when you don't reinvest in your human resource (the only renewable one available in retail), your short term profit becomes a long-term loss and possibly a death knell to your business.

[mosh]

The answer to corporate greed is strong unions. We have known this for hundreds of years. Time for the WalMart employees to understand that the only power they have is in their numbers. It's simple math that adds up to power. That's why the republican corporatists hate unions. Vote Democrat.

[flanardiente]

WalMart sells junk, mostly imported from the sweatshops of the world. They treat their employees with arrogant hostility and their customers with contempt. What are they going to do when the rising cost of fuel raises the price of their imported junk beyond the limit that people want to pay? I have never understood the short-sighted greed of these grubby little people, who have never understood that the more prosperous their customers (and employees), the better business would be. The Marine dude was right, though--why would anyone short of a teenager working on a summer job want to work for this lowest form of bottom-feeding corporate life? I'd rather make camp under a freeway bridge than put myself in their hands.