Workers unite against Walmart

[JLives]

Why are you against properly compensating working people?

Define "properly compensate". By whose standards? These are unskilled, untrained, uneducated and sometimes over-aged. Their opportunities for better employment are severely limited. Why should their employer make up for their lack of motivation or their lack of education or their lack of foresight?

If the minimums went up, all employers would have to increase the amount they pay their employees. Not just the lower wages, either. If the guy next to you just started and was making double your wages after you'd been there for 10 years, would you just accept that? Nope, you would not. You would expect your wages to increase as well. If the new hire got benefits and a pension, you would expect the same.

Other than increasing minimum wages, how else would you "properly compensate" employees? I really have no idea how you would do that. Legislate that all employers can only keep a certain percentage of their profits and make them divide up the rest amongst their employees? You can't just target the super stores - it has to be across the board - so how will that affect any small businesses?

Not everybody is a working people. And when you have people who rely on government hand-outs and get comfy, they get lazy and don't even remotely try to better their lives. The same goes for people who receive something for nothing - they just expect to get more for nothing, too.

Goin' fishin', Jenny. Society will feed me, clothe me, shelter me and burp me. And buy me a bigger TV, too.

This thread is very specifically about working people so the last part of your post is not relevant. They should pay by the standards that allow employees to live without government assistance. Why should a company be allowed to have employees survive through government assistance (health care, WIC and food stamps) while making huge profits and then be the company that takes in the largest amount of these, excluding health care? If every employee received a raise the company would still be profitable (see my previous link). They don't need to raise prices, they need to stop being greedy. Society IS feeding these workers, while the Walton's reap the benefits.

[grammafreddy]

Who is going to set those standards, Jenny?

And what of all the other low wage earners with other companies? If WalMart was to start paying $15 for entry level wages, plus benefits and a pension plan, what will that do to the little mom and pops, the gas bars, the restaurants, the fast food places, the little independent delis, etc? Do you think they will be able to match WalMart's new wages? Will they have to raise their prices in order to survive? If they do, even with new wage levels, the WalMart employees will be in exactly the same boat they are in now - they won't be able to afford to shop anywhere but WalMart.

[JLives]

You are OK with taxpayers subsidizing private employers while making huge profits? Why is corporate welfare OK but not individual?

[grammafreddy]

I'm not okay with a lot of the things you keep proposing, Jenny. I don't like subsidies much - because government can't afford all these "helping hands". You seem to only see one side of this without even considering the ramifications to all other businesses.

Do you only want to ding WalMart and nobody else? You know that won't fly.

How much of a ding can your employer handle? If WalMart employees are getting $15 or $20 an hour, will you also want that? You have skills and experience and training. Are your skills worth less than WalMart's greeter gets?

[coffeeFreak]

Here is an interesting read on how government is subsidizing workers in low income jobs. So not only are these corporations receiving government incentives, the government is also paying to keep their employees healthy...Walmart appears to top the list for employees drawing from state health insurance programs...

Disclosures of Employers Whose Workers and Their Dependents are Using State Health Insurance Programs

Updated January 18, 2012

Since the mid-20th Century, most Americans have obtained health insurance through workplace-based coverage. In recent years there has been a decline in such coverage caused by a rise in the number of jobs that do not provide coverage at all and growth in the number of workers who decline coverage because it is too expensive.

Faced with the unavailability or unaffordability of health coverage on the job, growing numbers of lower-income workers are turning to taxpayer-funded healthcare programs such as Medicaid and the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP).

This trend is putting an added burden on programs that are already under stress because of fiscal constraints caused by medical inflation and federal cutbacks. Many states are curtailing benefits and tightening eligibility requirements.

It also raises the issue of whether states are being put in a position of subsidizing the cost-cutting measures of private sector employers.

Across the country, policymakers and others concerned about the healthcare system are pressing for disclosure of information on those employers whose workers (and their dependents) end up in taxpayer-funded programs...READ MORE

http://www.goodjobsfirst.org/corporate-subsidy-watch/hidden-taxpayer-costs

[coffeeFreak]

Here's a tongue in cheek commentary about Walmart by:

Michael is a comedian/VO artist/Columnist extraordinaire, who co-wrote an award-nominated comedy, produces a chapter of Laughing Liberally, wrote for NY Times Laugh Lines, guest-blogged for Joe Biden, and writes a column for MSNBC.com.

Walmart Is America’s First Welfare Queen Superstore
2012/07/20
By Michael Hayne

After it was reported that the heirs of Walmart were worth the same amount as the bottom 40 percent of Americans, you probably thought there couldn’t possibly be anymore reasons to hate the colossal seller of crappy merchandise. Paying its Chinese workers a nickel-an-hour to make more Snuggies and making its octogenarian greeters stand for hours in order to say hello to shoppers who belch and fart in their direction is really appalling, but that it reaps the biggest benefits from the food stamp program–the evil socialist program that dares to allow working families to eat something other than discarded paint chips, and the very program that Republicans smear and want to destroy–truly ups the ante.

Walmart receives between 25 and 40 percent of all food stamp spending. Of course Walmart’s slave wages force all of its employees to depend heavily on $2.66 billion in government help every year. The company that brought in $448 billion in sales last year, the super concrete-laden seller of brightly colored crap, gobbles up food stamps faster than land. Walmart’s ridiculously low wages and deliberate underemployment keep their workers just rich enough to not be living in a dumpster co-op, but poor enough to be eligible for food stamps. Seeing as Walmart is the reason why countless Americans go on Food Stamps in the first place, one could say this is a low-cost orgy of irony.

- Walmart’s intentionally low wages force employees to need approximately $420,000 per year, per store, totalling $2.66 BILLION annually in food stamps and other taxpayer assistance…to survive.
- Walmart’s intentionally low wages cost the country HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS of dollars in payroll tax deductions for Federal, State, and Local taxes.
- Walmart’s intentionally low wages cost our communities the ability to hire and retain important public service workers like firefighters, police officers, maintenance workers, and teachers.
- Walmart’s intentionally low wages cost our communities with their increased need for those same public services they are underfunding.
- Walmart’s intentionally low wages and lack of covered benefits cost taxpayers over $1.02 BILLION a year in healthcare costs.
- Walmart’s intentionally low wages cost taxpayers as much as $225 MILLION in free and reduced price lunches for school-age children.
- Walmart’s intentionally low wages cost taxpayers over $780 MILLION in tax deductions for low-income families.

That’s right–Walmart pays its employees dirt, reaps enormous profits, forces its employees to enroll in social programs like food stamps, and then profits even further as its employees and all the other Americans still recovering from the economic abortion caused by the Walmarts of the world spend their food stamps. But why bother introducing legislation that seeks to impose severe fines on multibillion dollar corporations who line their pockets at the expense of taxpayers by refusing to pay their employees fair wages when it’s just so much easier to kill the poor.

http://www.addictinginfo.org/2012/07/20/walmart-is-americas-first-welfare-queen-superstore/

[grammafreddy]

Here is an interesting read on how government is subsidizing workers in low income jobs. So not only are these corporations receiving government incentives, the government is also paying to keep their employees healthy...Walmart appears to top the list for employees drawing from state health insurance programs...

That doesn't surprise me at all ... or that the other "big box" stores and McDonald's also were high on the list. After all, they employ the greatest number of people, don't they?

It's actually quite amusing to watch you folks slamming Walmart and demanding better wages yet you don't carry your ire beyond WalMart or the other major big box employers. These businesses pay the mandated minimum wages - and so does just about every big or small retail outlet anywhere there is a legislated minimum. Where's your anger at the dollar stores? Why aren't you *bleep* about the wages at the fast food places (besides McD)? Motels start their staff at minimum, too, and so do the private liquor stores. Most small grocery stores pay only minimum, too. Most retailers of all kinds don't hire all full time staff with higher wages benefits - and they never did - but you are not choked and up in arms about them, are you?

WalMart hires people who otherwise would not have jobs - the unskilled and uneducated. Canadian Tire hires mentally handicapped people. Home Depot and WalMart (and others) hire older folks that nobody else wants. I know there's a woman in a wheelchair who works at Walmart in Kelowna. The wages they pay are higher than what these people would get on welfare or disability - which the taxpayer pays for. These businesses are actually saving you, the working people, money because otherwise, all those hundreds of thousands of employees would be living totally off YOUR paycheques.

[coffeeFreak]

GF, likely because it is the largest retailer in the world. For me it I think it's because Walmart epitomizes our society and the dilemma we all live with whether we like to or not.

[Captain Awesome]

For me it I think it's because Walmart epitomizes our society and the dilemma we all live with whether we like to or not.

Well, if Walmart didn't provide a valuable service, people wouldn't shop there. If Walmart was an awful place to work in, people wouldn't work there. If it's truly is a useless entity with nothing good going on, it will go out of business in a hurry.

Off to Walmart to buy laundry detergent. Can't find it anywhere cheaper!

[grammafreddy]

If all those hundreds of thousands of WalMart and other minimum wage earners did not have dollar stores and WalMart to shop at, where would they shop? Could they afford to buy at the smaller, more expensive retailers? Did people on welfare and disability have more then than they have now working for minimum wages instead of collecting your money every last Wednesday of the month?

These people now have JOBS. They are now paying into the system instead of collecting from the system.

[grammafreddy]

For me it I think it's because Walmart epitomizes our society and the dilemma we all live with whether we like to or not.

Can you please explain what you mean by this?

[coffeeFreak]

It's gone beyond simply supporting local business. Our society is operating similar to the cycle of poverty which is explained as a "set of factors or events by which poverty, once started, is likely to continue unless there is outside intervention." Seems to me, that with all the freetrade etc agreements we have sold our souls for, that it is too late for "outside intervention".

As an aside...I am staying in Merritt for a bit. I remember coming to the downtown core years ago, and it was a bustling welcoming lived in place. Enter, Walmart...the locals could not compete and one by one many of the stores that brought life to the downtown core are gone and instead there are many closed businesses and Saturday mornings it seems like a ghost town. Yet drive to the edge of town and the walmart lot is full. It just seems...sad to see where we as a society are moving. And yeah, I'm just as guilty. I hate shopping at any big box store, but if it helps me stretch my dollar I'll do it.

Here's a doc that discusses how our world is changing because of the influence on corporate influence:

You, Me, and the SPP: Trading Democracy for Corporate Rule is a feature length documentary which exposes the latest manifestation of a corporatist agenda that is undermining the democratic authority of the citizens of North America.

Two processes, the Security Prosperity Partnership (SPP) and the Trade Investment Labour Mobility Agreement (TILMA) are rapidly eroding and eliminating standards, civil liberties, regulatory systems and institutions put in place over generations through the democratic process. Proponents of the SPP and TILMA say that they are needed to keep trade flowing, opponents say these agreements not only undermine the democratic authority of citizens they threaten the sovereignty of the three nations through the integration of military, security structures and regulatory regimes.

Even though the SPP (Security Prosperity Partnership) is officially finished, this film provides an excellent background to this agenda and helps to expose how quickly and easily the corporate elite and their political cronies will abandon democratic principles to consolidate their own power, control and authority at the expense of citizens rights.

http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/trading-democracy-for-corporate-rule/

[zookeeper]

As an aside...I am staying in Merritt for a bit. I remember coming to the downtown core years ago, and it was a bustling welcoming lived in place. Enter, Walmart...the locals could not compete and one by one many of the stores that brought life to the downtown core are gone and instead there are many closed businesses and Saturday mornings it seems like a ghost town.

I remember a documentary on tv years ago, when Walmart first arrived in Canada, that said exactly this happens. Towns "within 30 miles" of Walmart became ghost towns. Almost 20 years is proving this to be true.

[JLives]

I don't have a problem with paying minimum wages for entry level employees. I have a problem with keeping long term workers at minimum wage when massive profits are being made for a few people while the government is subsidizing them. The taxpayers are giving this money straight to the pockets of the Walton family, that is corporate welfare. The link I posted earlier shows their wage structure and how little of a chance there is for advancement, there are very few people making decent wages in that company.

Where did people shop 30 years ago? Did we have masses of people in the streets collecting welfare? No, we did not. This is not a new idea. The income gap and unequal distribution of resources is the problem. It applies to dollar stores, fast food places and any other place that systematically keeps workers on low wages for massive profits while denying health benefits and paying so little they need to rely on food stamps. Those places are not to the extreme that WalMart is, and this thread is about WalMart workers specifically, so that is why the focus is on them in particular.

[Bejvas]

It summarizes most of it...