We’ve been talking about big business and monopolies for the past week and Wal-Mart has come up a few times. I found a very interesting video (from a liberal source) that does seek answers from both sides of the issue (Wal-Mart represents itself). You can read the transcript or stream the video. I’d suggest you watch the video to get the full picture. Is Wal-Mart a monopoly? What are the consequences if it is? I think looking at big business at the turn of the century is really important and it’s equally fascinating to contemplate this right now in the present moment. I’m eager to here your thoughts.
http://www.democracynow.org/2005/11/18/a_debate_does_wal_mart_work
p.s. thank you so much for all of your thoughtful comments on the last blog check-in. I was the last to respond.
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19 comments:
First off a technical note: the video doesn't start talking about wal-mart until a little before half way through.
I have extremely mixed opinions regarding all aspects of Wal-Mart. I also want to start by saying I'm not trying to be judgmental or demeaning in any way. What I've noticed about WM is that they play off of people's weaknesses. They come into small towns and wipe out all of the mom and pop businesses and limit citizens' employment options ranging from slim to null. Thus they create a sort of monopoly not of an industry but of a geographic location. This is awful, it's true. These people are forced to rely on sub-subsistence income and benefits for the most part, and have to struggle to make ends meet.
Now comes the big political philosophical question: is it a company's JOB to take CARE of its employees? Is it the government's? Who is responsible?
My thought is that it is every person's own responsibility to get it together and make it work. there are a PLETHORA of options available to ANYONE who wants it badly enough. I know this from experience; both of my parent grew up in extreme poverty and yet were able to overcome and make it happen. Having this history has greatly affected my personal view of welfare, benefits, and such. In the film they discussed people "abusing the system" and that such accusations weren't true. My thought is that if Wal-Mart is so bad that these people cannot eat lunch, why stay? It's understandable for young people making their start in life, but when people are staying to make a CAREER out of WM, they have no right to complain. If working full-time at WM isn't working for you, it's time to move on.
I'm well aware that's often extremely difficult to do, which is why I started by noting WM's monopolizing effect upon communities. However, it's up to everyone to get creative in order to make things happen. People should not expect to have subsistence dumped into their laps for putting in full hours at WM. It is called unskilled labor for a reason. That is. after all, how the Waltons end up taking so much home everyday. They're well aware that WM is often a last option job, one that people can use to bounce back and get back on their feet to a decent career. They're DISCOURAGING people from joining their company by having such terrible benefits, AND YET there are those people who stay and expect to move up. If they do, good for them, they made it work. If not, WHY STICK AROUND FOR ANOTHER THIRTY YEARS??? Take a hint, it's time to move on. Just because you couldn't get your act together does not mean it's time to complain and ask WM to take care of you. People need to start being creative with their careers instead of locking themselves into a huge corporation and expecting all to turn out alright. After all, that is the genesis of Mom and Pop businesses: an individual's idea and the execution of that idea. WM is a Mom and Pop to the extreme- because they had an idea: let's extort all the lazy people of this country's money. Look, it worked, and still is working.
They say if you can't beat 'em, join 'em, but what they hould add is "don't expect to then be in a perfect world". If Wal-Mart tears apart your town, and you jsut say ah well, better go wrk there then, what on Earth would posses you to believe they have any interest in taking care of you? They just annihilated your city with economic attacks... to earn money... for themselves...
Evolution didn't occur because the weakest organisms had benefits.
I know I sound very condemnatory, if not hateful, but I really am merely expressing what I have observed in more than one circumstance in more than one geographic location. I fully empathize for those who are struggling to make it with low wages. But I solidly believe that without that pressure to improve, people rely to much upon others to care for themselves. It is a difficult and arduous journey, but it is possible for everyone. With the technological age the resources available are endless, the possibilities infinite.
I believe that this type of monopoly is bad for several reasons. Wal-Mart treats it's employees like dogs and its utterly ridiculous. They try to vindicate themselves by b.s. They know they treat their employees like dogs, that they shatter towns, that they ultimately eliminate all competition. Obviously with out a doubt it is good for the company but it is horrible for the people of the community and the employees. Wal-Mart pays low wages and the health care plan is horrible etc. When Wal-Mart eliminates competition town by town, what other options do the people of the community have to make money but to work there. Wal-mart not only kills off any chance of competition but also ruins many lives and it knows it. Wal-Mart is a screwed up company with no morals or ethics.
I disagree with Lauren because i think you are making it way easier than the situation seems. I'm sorry but i think that this type of situation limits choices and they cant just leave the company. The people rely on Wal-Mart because its their only source of income in the town. I dont think its a company's job to take care of its employees rather it is one of the major requirements. Despite your knowledge of this because of your parents, its not that easy to get creative and its takes time. A lot of time. It takes careful planning and people need money. They dont WANT it they NEED it so with all due respect, rather than criticizing the people, i think it is best to look at the situation from a certain point of view from the people of a specific community which is run by wal-mart.
You're very right Shawn- and after rereading my comment I don't feel like I expressed my point properly.
So let me try to clear some things up:
Right off the bat, let me establish that I wholeheartedly DISagree with Wal-Mart's practices; I'm aware that they're inhumane and downright evil.
That being said- their business plan works.
The majority of people in this country work in service jobs, so those people are not as greatly affected when Wal-Mart comes marching into town and eats up all of the local retail places.
What Wal-Mart realizes is that those who do in fact work in retail and such WILL be annihilated. This is a pattern that repeats over and over again. So if you see Wal-Mart coming, why even stay to try and compete? I'm simply saying it's a series of bad choices on local people's part. As I wrote in my previous post, why would you expect a massive extortionist corporation to provide you with great benefits?
By adopting these policies, Wal-Mart actually helps the case against them. If Wal-Mart had great health care and such, would we even be having this discussion? If this were the case, we might overlook the cultural implications that would follow a great homogenization of our country's retail outlets. However, because we can so easily portray Wal-Mart as the big evil manifestation of "the man", it's that much easier to fight all that it stands for.
I in no way support Wal-Mart and the cheap crap they sell. I do not support their treatment of employees.
HOWEVER, there are two types of people working at Wal-MartL those forced by lack of emplyment options and those using it as a career. I do not like to hear of people trying to make a career out of Wal-Mart and EXPECTING abounding resources to fly at them. It's simply illogical. It is a bad decision to join a company which has historically extorted every resource and cut every corner to squeeze every last penny out of every square foot. I do not understand the logic behind trying to work for and represent a company which is, for lack of a better word, a bad company in all respects. Even if WM then provided these people with great benefits, their morals (child labor, homogenization of the company) would still be intact. I fully support those who are trying to get out of Wal-Mart and are there merely as either secondary employment or because there simply is no other work at the time. I do not support them STAYING THERE AND MAKING NO ATTEMPT TO GET OUT.
No one forces you to work at Wal-Mart; it is hard, but I honestly believe it is always possible to find SOMETHING else, even if it means moving to the next town, even if it means trying for a few years.
The problem with trying to check Wal-Mart is one which could potentially set a great precedent, and potentially harm our country. If we start seriously checking major corporations, where do we draw the line between our country's free values and socialism? There are great aspects and ideologies behind both without question, but which is "better"?
I have one friend who moved from Ireland because al he witnessed was people using the system and living off the hard work of others who then paid immense taxes for their unemplyment benefits.
Likewise, I know of other people who absolutely love living in Norway to assure that they would have myriad social benefits.
In France, the state pays 75% of all medical bills. Many oppose this for a great number of reasons, while others feel confident that it provides a safety net for its citizens. Which is "right"?
It is impossible to say. One thing is for sure: the more Wal-Mart keeps mistreating its employees, the more they are fueling their own end.
I think it would be reasonable to pass legislation requiring more employee benefits not to help the employees necessarily (though that would certainly be a benefit), but to throw off Wal-Mart's model and have them collapse. If Wal-Mart were greatly downsized, it could begin to function as a normal company, and people could but would not need to rely upon it for employment.
Okay. A couple things to start off. One, I'm going to both respond to previous comments and leave one of my own in this post. Two, as a disclaimer, I watched the first bit of the video and skimmed the rest.
Right, so...I felt that the video didn't really talk about Walmart's role a a monopoly. It was more concerned with things like what WM does that works and what they should fix. As a result, a lot of my opinions may be based just on my personal experience with the company.
Lauren's right. Walmart often comes in out of nowhere and builds a huge supercenter in the middle of a town full of mom and pop shops. The big corporation that it is, Walmart has "benefit" plans that small businesses can't offer to employees. However, like Lauren mentioned above, they sort of have a monopoly on a geographic location, like the small town that the lady from Colorado was from. Thus, WM can afford to have crappy benefit plans because their employees wouldn't be getting better healthcare anywhere else. Their only other options are to receive healthcare from the government (which is a long-shot) or to get on individual coverage outside of WM. The government has to do all sorts of checks and investigations and ultimately, most people don't qualify for government-run healthcare programs. The downside to invdividual insurance is that it's so expensive. Insurance companies offer businesses decent rates because they know they'll gain it all back on individuals. As an example, my dad is starting a community bank, but it's not running yet, which means that he's technically not employed. We just past the 18-month mark of when he left his last job, which means that they no longer are required to cover him under their policies. So, until the bank opens (hopefully soon), my family is stuck paying through the roof for individual health insurance. I think this difficulty of obtaining health insurance is one of many reasons why many of the presidential candidates have devised universal healthcare plans.
You know, that's pretty much true: without pressure to improve their lifestyle, people will never have the motivation to better their lives. At the same time, should the common man get punished so that Walmart's high-power execs can spend all their time playing golf at five-star resorts? I think what this really boils down to is survival of the fittest. Without social services or government intervention, the weakest are just going to get weeded out. The rich will get richer and the poor will get poorer...until they eventually can no longer support themselves and die out. Can we live with that? Don't the poor deserve to be here as much as much as the rich do? The government can't exactly go in and completely adjust Walmart's business plans. However, it can set standards for things such as employee benefits that Walmart has been skimping out on.
Oh yeah. I wanted to share my own personal monopoly story. So the other day I was driving home and I suddenly got the urge for a cupcake. So I drive over to this place called Dots (which is basically like a Sprinkles knock-off). The service at Dots sucks. The owner is a bitch and they're always out of cupcakes. On Valentine's Day an HOUR before closing, how can you be OUT OF CUPCAKES? Well, my answer to Dots' horrible service is simple: go somewhere else. But wait. I can't. The next closest cupcake place is probably Sprinkles and that's in Beverly Hills. (I live in Pasadena.) So, I'm forced to deal with the crappy service at Dots or just forgo cupcakes. Dots literally has a monopoly looming over the gourmet cupcake eating population of Pasadena. So should I be forced to deal with crappy service just because there's nothing else around? Should I be forced to give up cupcakes because I don't like one store? I feel like these are the types of questions that employees at Walmart are facing.
This is a difficult situation to judge because I feel that the argument in favor of Wal Mart was not as strong or convincing as the argument against Wal Mart's practices and business model. Having a monopoly eliminates competition. If there is no competition in any given market then there is only one place in which people can purchase their goods. Wal Mart is one such place and is definitely a monopoly. Wal Mart keeps its prices so low that no other retailer could possibly compete. It is great to have a retailer that sells products at low, reasonable, affordable prices, but if the quality of the goods does not remain consistently good, their people suffer and have no other retailer to turn to. Wal Mart is a multi billion dollar monopolistic corporation. Because the company has compromised by selling low cost goods their profit margin is low and the company therefore is not able to provide adequate healthcare benefits. Despite its low price business model, the company does not even offer substantial health care benefits to its full time employees and instead encourages them to apply for government aid. Are the low prices really worth it if the company’s employees are forced into bankruptcy? I think that Wal Mart is selfish in that they want to spend as little money as possible on their employees. The company has gone as far as to hire as many healthy individuals as possible in order to keep healthcare costs lower. That is just ridiculous. Employees of Wal Mart are faced with a tough decision when healthcare becomes too expensive: quit a full time job and be forced to look for a new one or settle for inadequate healthcare benefits. The company clearly has a flawed business model that is in need of improvement.
-NISHA
In regards to Lauren's question of whether it is part of a company's duty to provide for their employees, I agree with Lauren's comment that the duty lies within the individual. It is up to the individual to make the best out of their job. If you want a better job and you have the ability to obtain a better job then you can do just that. You cannot always rely on others in hopes that they will be able to provide benefits such as health care for you.
-NISHA
For me, this is actually one of the harder blog assignments that we have gotten this year because I don't know much about the economy/business practices. Although watching the video and reading the transcript have taught me something about big business (whether it is the setbacks or benefits), I still am not 100% sure where I stand on the issue.
It is obviously easier to sympathize with the opponents of Wal Mart because of the moral issues that they address, which is what I am going to do, but I still don't think it is a black-and-white issue, which makes it very difficult to decide where I stand.
I somewhat understand where the pro-Wal Mart argument that Michael F. Cannon talked about by using an analogy with apples comes from: "If the government is giving health coverage away for free, how can Wal-Mart compete with that? If the government is selling—if you’re selling apples on one side of the street, and the government moves in on the other side of the street and starts giving away apples for free, and then the government starts criticizing you because people aren’t buying your apples anymore? I mean, how ridiculous is that?" But once again, I don't think the issue is as simple as that, which complicates the matter.
It really affected me when Edith Arana, Wal-Mart inventory specialist said "You start weighing-- okay, he's sick/we eat. Which one do we do? Well, let's give him an aspirin." When hard-working people have to make those decisions, it says something about big business practices and the constant greed for more money. If Wal-Mart makes so much money, why can't they give better health benefits? Does the Walton family really think they need that much money at the expense of their employees?
I also really don't like the fact that Wal-Mart is only worried about their appearance/reputation. Businesses shouldn't even need to have "war rooms." It seems like business and politics are too intertwined when former presidential advisors are PR workers for a company. I was also really bugged when Ron Galloway mentioned Jim Gilliam's lung transplant. It seemed like he was just trying to look like the sympathetic "good guy" in the situation.
Another big argument made by Wal-Mart is that they create so many jobs for American workers, which in turn, helps the economy. This may have been true when Sam Walton's "Buy America Program" was in effect, but now, Wal-Mart gets so much of its merchandise from China "at the expense of American jobs, and it comes with the abandonment of Sam Walton’s philosophy. This isn’t the same company that it once was."
Overall, I think that the greed of the Waltons and other high-up Wal-Mart executives has corrupted the original goal of creating Wal-Mart.
I really disagree with Lauren in terms of people having so many options, yet for some reason choosing to work at Wal-Mart and then complaining about it. That is the whole reason it's called a MONOPOLY: people don't really have much of a choice. It is so easy to say, "Oh, well they should just get creative and get themselves out of this situation that they have put themselves in. They need to take responsibility." That is completely unrealistic and unfair.
This whole discussion really just makes me hate the Walton family. America is supposed to be a land of opportunity, but they are unapologetically making it a land without opportunity, without choice, without morals or ethics.
It's so interesting how the power of Walmart and other super rich companies enables them to almost entirely control the image they present to the outside world. The fact that Walmart has a press "war room" with the purpose of combatting negative reports suggests that there must be a significant amount of such reports, but I've never really heard of any of them.
In the first documentary, its actually hilarious that they show this woman praising her healthcare, specifically her dentist, and yet she's blatantly missing her front tooth...
So apparently Walmart's health coverage lies "somewhere in the middle" (or whatever the guy said). But that makes you wonder: when does competition becomes detrimental to the country as a whole? Is this competition between industries causing the quality of working life to decrease? Are the goods we purchase of a lower caliber than those we might have bought 5 years ago? When do we reach the point where we stop this decrease in quality?
I think it's rediculous for the guy in the first video to imply that the government offering cheaper health care than walmart is unfair. Um hello, the point of healthcare is to offer it to as many deserving people as possible. It's interesting that Walmart doesn't try to compete with the government to keep their employees on Walmart health care. What would happen to all these employees if there was no government aid "across the street"? They wouldn't be able to afford healthcare at all.
I have to admit that most of this video kind of confused me. I know that both films were completely prone to propoganda, so it's really hard for me to make a very educated judgement on the situation. Most often, I'm prone to side with the less advantaged people. This is America and everyone deserves a chance. Even if Walmart is not as detrimental to society as the anti-Walmart video may suggest, I don't see why they can't find the spirit of generosity within themselves and actually try to HELP America GROW. I'm starting to realize that the Gilded Age of the late 19th and early 20th century really ingrained social classes into our society. Obviously, it is impossible to have a society where everyone is truly equal. But must the upper class citizens be SO far removed from the lower class? It also applies to the photography exhibit we saw the other day. The photographer begged us to find some connection between ourselves and these forsaken souls. What's so different about us? Why is it that we must compete for success, that we maintain this somewhat social darwinistic (word?) mentality? Would it be so hard to share the resources? To give others the opportunity to succeed? The Waltons need to stop being selfish and try to return to the fundamental values that America was founded upon: equality.
I think some of the comments that people have left are really myopic and narrow-minded. First of all, opportunities are not equitably distributed throughout this country. That is a fact. How presumptuous to judge those who have built their careers at WM.
What if they havn't had the luxury (because it seems to be a luxury nowadays) of a decent education? What if they can't afford to move to another town where there are more options? What if they have a family to support?
I have a friend who lives in New Hampshire and is 16 years old. She supports her entire family of 4 (a mother, a father and an OLDER sister). She doesn't get good grades because she spends all her spare time at three different jobs, but her intelligence is obvious. Her mom just got fired so now neither of her parents are working, and they have just been evicted from their house.
She happens to work at Wal-Mart.
What an idiot, right?
There's no one to blame. It's a self-destructive system. I respect everyone's opinions, but I think as a general rule it's in good taste to refrain from criticizing people of whose situations you are unfamiliar with.
I just went to Wal-Mart over the 3-day weekend, and was surprised at the actual size of it. It's like a Costco and a Target put together into a huge, super-retailer. And the prices were definitely low. Before actually seeing Wal-Mart I was very much against it because there is no way to overlook the fact that it is a monopoly. But many people rely on WM's low prices, and for their sakes, Wal-Mart likes to show that it does help the public. On this large screen in every checkout line, it showed the amount of money Wal-Mart is saving Americans, which is close to 2 billion and counting.
However, from watching the videos, 2 billion seems like lunch money compared to the amount the amount Wal-Mart takes from the government. The supporter of WM, Ron Galloway, actually pointed out that WM gives 2 billion to their workers in health benefits or something (i don't really remember) and receives $73 billion from the government. So the 2 billion that Americans save is given to WM's employees, making sure that WM really doesn't need to give away anything extra to its workers. It's a very sneaky system and it raises questions about where the rest of the money is going. Wal-Mart is so huge, the biggest employer in America?, that it can basically ignore government processes, the rules of democracy an dthe well-being of its employees. By forcing employees to go to the gov't for aid, WM takes advantage of the state, of tax, and of the gov't's help. As WM grows and expands globally, it sucks money out of the US gov't. The money necessary to pay for health care for its workers could simply come out of the Waltons' pockets because they have plenty to give, but they ignore their workers entirely.
In response to Lauren's comment, I do think it is a company's job to provide care for its workers, while I agree that the problem is that some people do take advantage of the system when they should be responsible for themselves. But with Wal-Mart, their workers really don't have a choice but to turn to the government for aid because WM doesn't help them out financially. Lauren made a good point: if people leave WM to look for other work, WM would have to change their policies. Wal-Mart takes full advantage of its size and power to indirectly leech of the gov't and ruin many businesses. I guess since WM is such a big business, it is difficult for them to provide benefits for ALL of its workers. But where does all the money go? The Waltons have so much money that some should be given to help their own workers that make the Waltons wealth possible. They put their stores in cities where people already don't receive good benefits from smaller businesses, and then give them the amount WM can get away with. It's kinda weird that the pro-WM video only had lawyers speaking for the support of Wal-Mart. The pro-WM video excerpt mentioned that a lot of middle class people are taking advantage of gov't-provided financial aid. But that doesn't really seem to relate to WM, since most of its workers are not members of the middle class.
The biggest problem I see with Wal-Mart is the low wages it pays to its employees and manufacturers. I do not know the ins and outs of the system nor how the business manages its money, (and I know that the pro-Wal-Mart man says that the company walks a thin line), but it seems to me that such a massively wealthy company can and should pay its workers more adequately.
I view this problem more as a lack of generosity on the part of the Waltons than some sort of law-violation. What makes me sick is the company's cutthroat struggle to maximize profits. There's no way that, with the amount of profit Wal-Mart accumulates, the prices of the vended goods are as low as they can be. Why not maintain the current low prices, forfeit some of the profit, and return that money to the employees in the form of health care coverage and other forms of insurance. I speculate that, considering the amount of money the Waltons make, losing even several billion dollars in profit will not affect them in a significant way.
-Jack
My Dad used to work for a development company, and he told me that the new tract houses being built are retailed for more than ten times the price they cost to construct. On top of that, under-paid illegal workers who have not been well trained are constructing them poorly. He himself worked in construction, and he has seen first hand the incompetence with which these houses are being built.
This illustrates my concern with Wal-Mart's profits on a level I am more familiar with. The amount of profit the development companies are making for these poorly mass-produced houses is staggering and disgusting. Both the consumer and the producer are being "ripped off" and all the profit is going to a company that is serving no one to the fullest but itself. This clearly demonstrates the greed of these enormous, multi-billion dollar corporations.
-Jack
Wow, I realize that what I just wrote about regulating profits may sound like I'm a socialist. I would like to say that I am skeptical of laws that enforce revenues. I guess the only way to thwart corruption of large businesses is to demand that companies pay for their workers in a more just way, and though that will not directly cut company profits, it will prevent the entitlement of monopolies to wantonly cut wages and benefits.
-Jack again
I also find it interesting that the issue of Wal-Mart's alleged sexism was not in any way brought up.
Wait, I didn't know that Wal-Mart was accused of being sexist! Tell me more! What's the deal?
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