Walmart's policies and operations are bad for our economy. I can not even name all of the reasons. But here are some:
Outsourcing: Many of Walmart's product come from companies within China or other nations wanting to get a buck for America's materialistic tendencies. Sure this is good for their economies, but as far as America;s economy, it is bad for these reasons: It takes away jobs for many Americans by putting U.S. companies out of business. Many U. S. companies are unable to compete with the prices of other companies because of regulations posed in the U.S. that foriegn companies do not have to deal with. They are forced out of the marlet and many people lose their jobs, just like what happened ot Rubbermaid whose products were not the cheaper, but they were the better. The rubber used in their products rose in price, so therefore their prices rose. When it rose, Walmart said they would not sell their products unless price went back down and the only way to do so was to lower the quality of their products. Because of this, Rubbermaid lost to their competitors. Also, when one outsources, it sends U.S. dollars out of the country, and therefore causes problems wiht our currency. It also means that our import, export amounts change more toward importing more which is also horrible because it causes dependency other countries. Our relationship in trade with CHina is a bad one. OUr economy is so interwoven with theirs, that if their economy collapses, we are so dependent that we will be pulled down with them.
Wages: to keep prices lower, Walmart pays their employees the least amount possible. Because of this, it is difficult ofr the employees to afford much out of the poverty line. Minimum wage is not a good life. one can not afford much on minimum wage. Walmart is keping many people below poverty line and is increasing the poverty rate in America.
Quality versus Price : Walmart succeeds by having low prices. They can get everything cheap and sell it cheap, but the problem is that the qality is low, forcing the customer base to come back and get more when the product deteriorate faster than if it had cost just a little more.
Puts others out of market and out of business: Walmart's competitiveness is such that it easily puts many companies out of business. It is huge and it is cheap, making consumers go there instead of going to the slightly more expensive small mom and pop stores. Because of kthis, entry into the business is incredibly difficult and success and unlikely.
Walmart offers low prices, but at the same time, it is a recipe for disaster. Its power over our economy is just too much.
I agree with you 100%. The problem is, America needs low prices. Where else would they get them? Get rid of Wal-Mart and other low-price vendors will be ridiculed. Next thing you know there'd be a campaign against Target.
The question is, where do you draw the line between good paying jobs and low priced things?
The thing is that we as consumers are giving Walmart their power. But Walmart is not nessessarily the best now. I know low prices are great, but there has to be a line somewhere that we have to stand upsay "You just can not do this." I know that almost any store pays minimum wage, but at least most stores that have full-time employees do try ot take away all of their benefits. Like I said though, living a life on minimum wage is a horrible life and America's welfare system just does not do enough for those individuals who actually deserve it and want to get off the system, but need a leg up. America just needs to draw a line.
The main reason that Wal Mart has low prices is because they have so many stores. They buy products by bulk which makes the price per piece of merchandise lower.
And also outsourcing is not a problem. Don't get me wrong America is number one at receiving imports but one unknown fact is that we are also number one in exports too. But the politicians and the news do not want the people to know that.
And as far as quality of the merchandise, that is in every merchandise in every store. They make things cheaper and charge more. Kind of like the old saying "They don't make things like they used to."
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Not necessarily, I know that we export a lot of things, but are not most of our exports raw goods? The problem though with so much importing is that we are incredibly dependent for those items. I mean think about all our manufactured items, how many of them do you see the words "made in China" or "made in Japan" or "made in Taiwan" or "made in Korea" on them. America is horrible about manufacturing items now. That is our problem. We are dependent upon other nations to manufacture for us. If their economies fall, where are we going to get our manufactured goods? We would have to manufacture them and America does not manufacture very many things anymore, nor do we have much of an ability to. Most of the factories, except in the car industry and whatnot are out of date. We would have to invest loads of money to update them to our standards.
The reason you do not see many american goods is because they are exported. That is why you never see American Made.
And there are a lot of American coorporations that own factories that manufacture in other countries. Even though it says Made in Taiwan it most likly is still an American company.
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I looked this up, and the US Chamber of Commerce reported that in 2005, the United States exported $904,379,818,171 worth of goods in 2005 and imported $1,670,940,374,952 worht of goods in 2005. This means, that the United States does actuallt import more than we export which is a huge problem. Of which Walmart is contributting.
see http://tse.export.gov for the facts and figures.
actually, our economy is at a pretty good standing right now and we're considered fully employed because the US employment rate is currently under 5%. and when our unemployment rate is 5% and under, that's what we consider acceptable.
okay, let's also not trash on wal*mart now. i work there & i make a dollar twenty five more than i did when i was waitressing at a retirement community, making six twenty five an hour, now at wal*mart i make seven fifty and in ninety or so days, i'm entitled to a raise.
doesnt sound to bad to me.
a lot of things redneck said i'm in agreement with.
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I'm As Selfish As Selfish Comes
Most people do not understand how low are unemployment rate is.
http://www.colbertnation.com/
http://www.NRA.org/
I agree 100% about the quality versus price. recently, China was shipping childrens toys to Walmart that had lead poisoning in them. Also, walmart was also selling flip fops- coincidentally also made in China- that gave people rashes on the top of their foot (in the shape of a V) when they wore them. You make a lot of great arguements in this blog.