Walmart walkout: workers mount black Friday job action

[stevegravy]

And you are free to shop at a place that sources its products locally. But why would you want to take away my right to have a choice of where to shop? If I prefer cheap chinese made goods, why is that anyone’s business but my own?

Agreed

 

[SamH]

Because the free market and $$ is not God.

Why do you hold the free market to no standards?

You do realize that small businesses are in it for a profit too - right? Why do you want to the poor to pay more to line the pockets of the evil rich?

 

[SamH]

And you are free to shop at a place that sources its products locally. But why would you want to take away my right to have a choice of where to shop? If I prefer cheap chinese made goods, why is that anyone’s business but my own?

Actually mom and pops sell the exact same cheap chinese stuff as Wal-Mart - they only pay more for it (making the Chinese richer) and they charge more for it (making the poor poorer). So supporting the mom and pops is a Commie Plot.

 

[stevegravy]

Because many of us don’t care about job creation in China. We value the benefit of Americans first- and especially local Americans.

Maybe but we are in a global economy and your not going to change it. If Wal-Mart wont do it someone else will.

 

[ringil]

You do realize that small businesses are in it for a profit too - right? Why do you want to the poor to pay more to line the pockets of the evil rich?

You are just being coy.

 

[ringil]

Maybe but we are in a global economy and your not going to change it. If Wal-Mart wont do it someone else will.

Stop with font already.

 

[Seeker1961]

**“I struggle to support my family on $14,000 a year,” said Sara Gilbert, a customer service manager at the company for three years. “My children are in state housing and we get subsidized housing and food stamps.”

Economist Julianne Malveaux said, “[Walmart] employees earn around $8 an hour. This is not a living wage, this is not a working wage, and especially not a living wage when they’re not working 30 hours a week, which would allow them to get health insurance.”**

tv.msnbc.com/2012/11/19/leaked-document-reveals-walmarts-meager-compensation-structure/

Of course, then there is this issue with entitlements and according to the NeoCon, Tea Party and the GOP, such entitlements should be ended especially food stamps and subsidized housing for what has been labelled by the far right as hand outs for the moochers of society.

Try raising a family on that kind of salary with no dental, vision care for your children. One worker who was displaced because his job was outsourced to China could only find this type of work available to him. Every person should have a livable wage as it spurs economic growth. You treat your employees with respect and appreciation. The huge profits generated for the Walton family should shame this family into giving their workers an affordable wage. Their discrimination toward women is well documented in class action lawsuits as another side note.

I was watching a documentary on PBS of the Dust Bowl Era and how after years of trying to make a living on their farms, hard working people had to leave their lands and find work else where. They migrated to California where they were branded as ‘Okies’ and labeled as poor vagrants expecting a free hand out. They wanted a hand up not a hand out but the growers and contractors orchestrated together to lower migrant wages in the fields so that these people were basically working at slave wages without any health benefits for themselves or their children.
pbs.org/kenburns/dustbowl/

It never seems to end throughout human history, the attitudes of those well off toward the poor as being undesirables and lazy. The fact that these were once proud hard working farmers that owned their own land didn’t dispel this attitude. Farm work is the hardest work imaginable.

If Walmart and other low paying retail and service industry jobs paid $2 to $4 an hour more for full time workers, fewer people would be in subsidized housing and on food stamps. Pages ago I posted a link to a study that showed what raising wages to $10 an hour would do for the workers, for the business community and for the economy. The end of the world as we know it simply isn’t supported by actual numbers.

 

[ishii]

*** according to the NeoCon, Tea Party and the GOP, such entitlements should be ended especially food stamps and subsidized housing*** for what has been labelled by the far right as hand outs for the moochers of society.
.

Ecoclimber - who in the Tea Party, GOP or “Neo-Con” has called for ending entitlements like food stamps? Answer that question and we can have a conversation. When you unfairly caricature those with whom you disagree to the point of outright lying, then you become just an amen chorus between you and those who think of you. Anyone else tunes you out.

Ishii

 

[ishii]

If Walmart and other low paying retail and service industry jobs paid $2 to $4 an hour more for full time workers, fewer people would be in subsidized housing and on food stamps. Pages ago I posted a link to a study that showed what raising wages to $10 an hour would do for the workers, for the business community and for the economy. The end of the world as we know it simply isn’t supported by actual numbers.

And if the local restaurant paid its dishwasher another $4 or $5 dollars an hour he too would not need foodstamps or subsidized housing. But if the restaurant had to pay the dishwasher that much, it would raise the prices on the menu to compensate resulting in fewer customers and less business = fewer working hours for the dishwasher. So what is your solution? Do you want the federal govt. to set wages? Decide the number of hours worked and the menu prices?

Ishii

 

[Seeker1961]

And if the local restaurant paid its dishwasher another $4 or $5 dollars an hour he too would not need foodstamps or subsidized housing. But if the restaurant had to pay the dishwasher that much, it would raise the prices on the menu to compensate resulting in fewer customers and less business = fewer working hours for the dishwasher. So what is your solution? Do you want the federal govt. to set wages? Decide the number of hours worked and the menu prices?

Ishii

Read the Devo study…the math is already done for you.

 

[JMJSHJ]

Walmart grants its employees:

• Consumer-directed health plans, including Health Reimbursement Accounts (HRA) plans and a high-deductible plan with a Health Savings Account (HSA). Highlights include:

•     100 percent coverage for eligible network preventive care

•     $4 co-pay on thousands of eligible generic drugs

•     Maternity Program – personal support network before, during and after pregnancy

• HMO plans (available on a location-by-location basis)

• Dental insurance

• Free confidential counseling and health information service

• Quit Tobacco program

• Company-paid life insurance for associates; optional and dependent life insurance available

• Accidental death & dismemberment insurance (AD&D)

• Critical illness insurance

• Accident insurance

• Short- and long-term disability insurance

• Associate Eyewear Program

• **401(k) plan**

• ** Associate Stock Purchase Plan**

• Associate Discount Card: various discounts in-store and online at Walmart.com, including 10 percent off fresh fruits and vegetables for Walmart associates/annual membership for Sam’s Club associates

• Exclusive discounts on travel, entertainment and more

• Military differential pay

With a list of these “benefits” and it costing Wal-Mart money, wouldn’t it be a good idea that employees could opt out of them and receive the direct monetary funding for them? E.g. Base salary $8/hour. Benefits $10/hour. Cost to Walmart for each employee $18/hour. Under new plan:
Base salary $8/hour +$5 of benefits opted out and $5 kept Employee gets $13/hour and $5/hour of benefits.

 

[Arrependida]

Would you rather they collect unemployment? For some people, Walmart is the best job they can get.

If Walmart is the best job they can get, they should be more grateful then and try to keep their job…

One of the reasons prices are really low at Walmart is probably the low wages…
I see it actually as a great thing to have a store in this country where the poor can buy food and other necessities for a very low price like at Walmart. When we think about the common good of the society as a whole, it is better to keep Walmart the way it is and not now have those union wages that will drive prices up for everybody.
I see Walmart as almost a charitable institution because of the low prices it has. And a profitable one! I wish the poor people in the country I come from would be able to access the low prices practiced at Walmart in America. They have Union wages over there, and everything costs double.

 

[ishii]

Read the Devo study…the math is already done for you.

What does an 80’s new wave band like Devo have to do with Walmart? Okay I give up - where can I find the Devo study?

Ishii

 

[rlg94086]

What does an 80’s new wave band like Devo have to do with Walmart? Okay I give up - where can I find the Devo study?

Ishii

Forget about God made man
But he used the monkey to do it
Apes in the plan
We’re all here to do it
I can walk like an ape
Talk like an ape
I can do what a monkey can do
God made man
But a monkey supplied the glue

Are we not men?
We are Devo

…I hope that clears it up for you, ishii.

 

[colmywaykurtz]

I believe they are a couple hundred people out of a million walmsrt workers who are going to participate in this. Its another Union driven stunt. You would think they would be layiing low after the Hostess debacle

Hostess was the fault of greedy CEOs.

 

[RyanBlack]

I see Walmart as almost a charitable institution because of the low prices it has.

That is one of the most laughable, absurd statements I’ve ever read. To start out with, many of their prices are not really that low, at least not where I live. But even if they were so wonderfully low as you are asserting they are, as a former employee, I assure you that there is nothing charitable about WalMart. The Walton family has turned themselves into a bunch of billionaires, and the human cost has been the destruction of untold numbers of local businesses with real ties to communities, as well as the exploitation of most WalMart employees. As someone who is middle class, and who was never truly dependent on having a job at WalMart (I was in college at the time, and if necessary, my parents would have supported me), I find the remarks that WalMart employees should just be thankful to have their jobs to be terribly condescending.

 

[jeannetherese]

That’s the real point here, and with the folks at Target that are petitioning for the hours to be changed to something more realistic. They want their holiday with their family, and I don’t believe that should be something reserved for those who are able to get “better” jobs than Walmart or Target.

Workers at all levels should be treated well, and there are plenty of Church documents that support that-including the Bible!

Amen.
I’ve been boycotting Wall Mart for as long as I can remember.
Nickeled and Dimed: On Not Getting By in America by Barbara Ehrenreich does an excellent job discussing the challenges so many waged workers in the low waged positions of the service sector face in this country.
And of course I boycott Target as well. They supported gay marriage in relation to Referendum 74 on only a month ago.
Putting our money where our faith is seems like a good idea.
Now if we could get a list of corporations that stand up for Catholic principles to support.

 

[Arrependida]

I assure you that there is nothing charitable about WalMart.
The Walton family has turned themselves into a bunch of billionaires,
and the human cost has been the **destruction of untold numbers of local businesses with real ties to communities, **
as well as the exploitation of most WalMart employees.
As someone who is middle class, and who was never truly dependent on having a job at WalMart (I was in college at the time, and if necessary, my parents would have supported me), I find the remarks that WalMart employees should just be thankful to have their jobs to be terribly condescending.

1.Even though the goal of Walmart is not charity, but thankfully make profit, fact is they end up helping the poor with their low prices…
2.The Walton family has turned into billionaires? Good for them, the american dream of many immigrants like me… Envy is a sin you know…
3.Please, let’s not be melodramatic because all those old local business with real ties to community failed. Fact is those old fashioned stores had much higher prices. And stayed in the hands of the higher middle class people like you. The really poor never benefited from it.
About the real ties to the community stuff: I am poor and emotionally sound. I don’t need the real ties to the community stuff, I need low prices for my groceries. We poor cannot afford romantic and nostalgia…
4. Exploitation of Walmart employees? You must be kidding me. You believe this stuff? What do they do over there? Keep them tied to a pole and beat them? Are people forced to work for Walmart?
5. As somebody who is poor I am looking at the issue not from a middle class perspective like you, but from a poor persons perspective. And for us down here prices are more important than anything.

 

[RyanBlack]

1.Even though the goal of Walmart is not charity, but thankfully make profit, fact is they end up helping the poor with their low prices…
2.The Walton family has turned into billionaires? Good for them, the american dream of many immigrants like me… Envy is a sin you know…
3.Please, let’s not be melodramatic because all those old local business with real ties to community failed. Fact is those old fashioned stores had much higher prices. And stayed in the hands of the higher middle class people like you. The really poor never benefited from it.
About the real ties to the community stuff: I am poor and emotionally sound. I don’t need the real ties to the community stuff, I need low prices for my groceries. We poor cannot afford romantic and nostalgia…
4. Exploitation of Walmart employees? You must be kidding me. You believe this stuff? What do they do over there? Keep them tied to a pole and beat them? Are people forced to work for Walmart?
5. As somebody who is poor I am looking at the issue not from a middle class perspective like you, but from a poor persons perspective. And for us down here prices are more important than anything.

1. I have nothing against corporations making profits. They wouldn’t be in business otherwise. I am against the unethical business practices of WalMart, as well as their unbridled greed. And as I said before, their prices are not really that great, at least not in my experience.
2. Greed is a sin as well. Furthermore, you’re making an assumption that I’m envious–an assumption with far less basis than my assumption that WalMart and the Walton family are driven by greed.
3. You’re assuming quite a bit by calling me “higher middle class.” I’m not poor, but I’m hardly “higher middle class.” Furthermore, WalMart has a history of driving the competition out of business, and then raising their prices.
4. No, I’m not kidding. WalMart exploits poor, undereducated workers who have few other options. Most people who work at WalMart (pharmacists, optometrists, opticians, and store management excluded) don’t earn a living wage. Yes, to me, that is exploitation, when you consider the huge net income of WalMart.
5. If WalMart provides you with the best prices available, I don’t fault you for shopping there. I sometimes choose to as well. However, I acknowledge the fact that the benefit I receive from their lower prices (when they are in fact, lower), comes at a price, and that price is the ridiculously low wages they pay their employees.

 

[Arrependida]

Why is killing small business a bad thing? If people prefer to shop in big box stores then why would doing so be a bad thing?

Exactly, people have nowadays this romantic idea about small businesses…they would be the first to complain about the much higher prices small business would have to charge because of more complicated logistics and all the other costs involved. Just ask grandpa how many days a person had to work in order to make enough money to buy say a pair of jeans at those old time stores. You need not work one hour to make enough money to buy jeans at Walmart.
And they also forget that with those old time small businesses there is a lot of running around to compare prices, and buy bread here, meat there, clothes for the kids elsewhere, than drive once more to buy office supplies, …Reality is shopping was a major chore back then, and it still in countries with only small stores. I come from a country like that. We waste so much time running from store to store…If you have kids, it’s a nightmare, Dragging them from place to place. When I came to America I loved Walmart. Saves my time and money…