A New "Wal-Mart is Evil" thread...

I'm not a "Wal-Mart is evil" person. But I never shop there.

It's too crowded. It's too dirty. The money I spend isn't that much less than I spend at the Albertson's or the Walgreen's (which are both closer to my apartment than Wal-Mart.) Just not worth the hassle.

Back when I lived in BFE, I did almost all of my grocery shopping at Wal-Mart. That's because it was the only place open at 2 a.m. when I got off work, and that's when it was easiest for me to do my shopping. It was also the only place in that town to shop for anything -- kinda hard to choose another shop when there are no other choices, except to drive 25 minutes to the next town.

I always vowed that when I made more money, and I had other options, that I wouldn't shop at Wal-Mart if I could help it. Now that I do, and now that I do, I don't.

 

I agree that Wal-Mart is evil, but I'm not convinced it's any more evil than any other giant corporation out there.

I don't shop there, but I understand why people (including my father) do.

 

I doubt even the people who did those studies would say under oath that their results are inarguable. Good grief.

 

I don't like Wal Mart, but I don't get my shorts in a twist about it, either. People of all political persuaions get too worked up about symbolic issues...Wal Mart has become a symbol that represents things far beyond Wal Mart.

Arguing whether Wal Mart is good, bad or indifferent involves the same problem that all social sciences have: you're trying to use numbers to evaluate the quality of humans' collective or individual lives. Economics, sociology, political science, what have you...they all have the unenviable task of trying to quantify the unquantifiable.

I'd rather pay a few extra bucks to live in a world where my neighbors are paid fairly and treated with dignity. It's hard to trot out a lot of numbers to quantify the total social cost of people working places like Wal Mart. Some of the ripple effects from shitty jobs translate into numbers, some don't. It's pretty hard to understand if you've never had to make ends meet as an adult on that level of income. "Nickel and Dimed" really should be required reading for those who glory in the social benefits of minimum-wage jobs.

It's easy to compare the status quo to theoretical models that are worse than the status quo. That doesn't really prove anything. It sounds pretty convincing if you're not listening critically, though.

 

I couldn't agree more. I'd rather pay a few more dollars in stores owned by local people, which is what I do as much as I can. It adds to my quality of life when my downtown has some real life to it.

The last time I was in a Wal-Mart was after my wife's mom died and my wife's idiot nephews either forgot to pack appropriate attire for their grandmother's funeral or, worse, didn't know their grandma wasn't going to be laid out at the skateboard park. Off went my wife, me and the morons' mom to ... Wal-Mart. Ugh. I noticed absurdly low prices for Levis jeans, but when I went to inspect them, I noticed they were significantly thinner than my Levis jeans. Hmmm ... could it be that Levis, under strongarm pressure from Wal-Mart to sell cheap, said OK, you'll get your cheap Levis, but they won't be as good as regular Levis? As it turns out, a lot of brands have a cheaper-quality line made under their label for sale at those "outlet centers," including such brands as Polo and Brooks Brothers. So you get what you pay for. As someone else noted, there is no free lunch. Those jeans might be half the price, but they last half as long and look like shit.

 

This goes for other items as well, such as electronics and appliances. And of course, the record companies save money by taking out the curse words in the Wal-Mart CDs.

 

Writing Irish makes a point.

The $129.99 barbecue at al-Mart that's $25.00 less than what appears to be the same one as Joe Schmoe's Hardware is selling, isn't all the bargain it's cracked up to be.

Walmart says to its supplier, "I want this Barbecue but I have to buy it for $xxx." Problem is it cost the manufacturer 30% more than $xxx just to make the damn thing.

So they cut corners. Cut back on the qualilty of the materials that went into the original barbecue. Ostensibly it's the same, but it's not. It's cheaper but it's shoddy.

 

Ragu, you and I have already had a mult-page discussion about this. I was wondering when you were going to show up.

Your "market forces" theory doesn't quite work because Wal-Mart can decide what the market is. And the old "supply and demand" argument doesn't work if you comtrol both.

But rather than retyping all our arguments, why don't we just dredge up the old thread.

 

Then I guess the true worth of a African human being back in the 18th century or so would be about 50 pounds sterling...or 100 barrels of rum...or whatever the going rate happened to be.

Maybe the marketplace does reflect our collective values, Ragu. My response to that is, "What if our collective values are FUCKED?"

It's not anywhere near as "simple" as you think it is. It's not a "simple" question of supply and demand. It's human lives, not marketplace values. And sometimes, the "invisible hand" acts more like a fist.