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RE: The Walmart Endorsment - 8/3/2008 12:35:04 AM   
DomKen


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quote:

ORIGINAL: slaveboyforyou

quote:

Hey, glad you're gung-ho for slave wages and union busting. More power to you. Like I said before, this is way beyond the candidates. I'm sure it makes you all warm inside thinking of the Waltons --- some of the richest people in the world --- refusing to pay their workforce a living wage while outsourcing all their production to Communist China.


Yes we all know that Wal-Mart is evil.  How dare they resist efforts from union infiltrators.  How dare they only pay their employees the same pay that almost all retailers pay.  Look at Michigan with the highest unemployment rate in the country for the paradise that unions create. 

Let's look at that the right way round.

How dare they break federal and state laws protecting workers rights to organize. You're big on obeying all the laws aren't you?

How dare they pay significantly below the national average of what retailers pay?

Now let's look at Michigan. Let's look at GM which violently resisted unionization. Why are all those people in Flint unemployed? Is it because of the unions? First let's ponder why so much of those plants was simply left to rot. When GM moved the production lines to Mexico they didn't take all teh equipment. So why abandon capital investments? Why would the famously stingy GM walk away from that equipment? Was it perhaps because it was extremely old as none of the Flint plants had been significantly updated in decades? Was this lack of investment in GM's factories part of a plan to screw their unionized workers? Why was GM lobbying, spending tens of millions, to get the rules changed about importing cars from Mexico more than 5 years before they moved any plant? Why has GM continued to struggle with quality and making a profit after all these years of moving production to where labor was cheap and they don't have to deal with the UAW? Is it perhaps because GM's management is so riddled with incompetent members of the families that control the company that nothing anyone tries can succeed? After looking at all teh issues with GM's exodus from Michigan the major problem pretty clearly doesn't lie with UAW but with a spiteful GM management organization that more than 50 years after the company unionized still refused to accept that the workers had rights as well.

Another important detail that you're forgetting is unions are responsible for the middle class.To be middle class means making a decent wage which unions made possible for most of the people who entered the middle class. In this era of union busting we have people slipping out of the middle class or couples forced to both work to maintain a middle class standard. Ultimately GM and the other industrial and service companies that insist on paying the absolute minimum hurt their profitability since if their own workers can't buy their products that causes a rippel effect as others wages are driven down as well and soon enough too few people are left that can afford your product to keep you in business.

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RE: The Walmart Endorsment - 8/3/2008 4:17:33 AM   
thishereboi


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quote:

ORIGINAL: DomKen

quote:

ORIGINAL: thishereboi

My hatred of unions has nothing to do with McCain.

You hate the 40 hour work week? Why?
You also hate overtime pay? Again why?
You hate being allowed to go to the restroom at work? Why?

I could go on asking why you hate all the things you wouldn't have if not for unions but the list would get long and tedious. Suffice it to say that I doubt you have any idea what life would be like without labor unions.


What the hell do you think labor laws are for? If we were talking about 50 or 60 years ago, you might have a point, but unions are pointless now.

I have never worked for a union and I have NEVER had a problem with the things you have listed. If you can't get your boss to treat you fairly, then you need to find a new job.

Oh and life without labor unions? Wow, I wonder how much better the big 3 would be right now, if the unions hadn't forced them to keep unproductive workers and overpay them for years.


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RE: The Walmart Endorsment - 8/3/2008 7:09:00 AM   
DomKen


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quote:

ORIGINAL: thishereboi

quote:

ORIGINAL: DomKen

quote:

ORIGINAL: thishereboi

My hatred of unions has nothing to do with McCain.

You hate the 40 hour work week? Why?
You also hate overtime pay? Again why?
You hate being allowed to go to the restroom at work? Why?

I could go on asking why you hate all the things you wouldn't have if not for unions but the list would get long and tedious. Suffice it to say that I doubt you have any idea what life would be like without labor unions.


What the hell do you think labor laws are for? If we were talking about 50 or 60 years ago, you might have a point, but unions are pointless now.

I have never worked for a union and I have NEVER had a problem with the things you have listed. If you can't get your boss to treat you fairly, then you need to find a new job.

Oh and life without labor unions? Wow, I wonder how much better the big 3 would be right now, if the unions hadn't forced them to keep unproductive workers and overpay them for years.


Those labor laws exist because of labor unions. Union members died trying to get the 40 hour work week. Santayanna had something to say to those who ignore history.

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RE: The Walmart Endorsment - 8/3/2008 7:09:04 AM   
cloudboy


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Status: offline 		Have you worked for Walmart, the largest private employer in the world?

Why does everyone keep straying off the reservation?

Look at the facts: look here at numbers 23-25 and 26-29? The Waltons have gotten rich by fucking their employees. How could anyone with a soul so enrich themselves and not pay better wages to their own workforce?

< Message edited by cloudboy -- 8/3/2008 7:15:45 AM >

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RE: The Walmart Endorsment - 8/3/2008 7:15:04 AM   
lighthearted


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quote:

ORIGINAL: thishereboi

If we were talking about 50 or 60 years ago, you might have a point, but unions are pointless now.



I would have to agree with this, in my own experience.  the union I was a member of for four years was totally ineffectual and did nothing above what CA labor laws would have done anyway.

I understand their role in history and what they contributed to making workplaces safer, etc etc, but in the industry I worked in, their role was merely cursory.

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RE: The Walmart Endorsment - 8/3/2008 7:21:24 AM   
cloudboy


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Status: offline 		Just because you own union did a poor job in your case doesn't mean that all organized labor has seen its day set in the WEST.


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RE: The Walmart Endorsment - 8/3/2008 7:23:07 AM   
lighthearted


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Status: offline 		well, as it's what I studied in college, I feel somewhat qualified to have that opinion; my own experiences only reinforce what I studied.

I'm not saying that it's necessarily a good thing, I'm only saying, unions certainly don't have the power they used to.

edited for clarity.

< Message edited by lighthearted -- 8/3/2008 7:25:18 AM >

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RE: The Walmart Endorsment - 8/3/2008 7:28:09 AM   
cloudboy


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Status: offline 		What would you recommend to help workers get better pay and benefits in a company where ownership is making billions of dollars in profits?

Walmart's ideal situation is low wages, low taxes, and scant regulation from the government. Its now the largest employer in the world.

Do you see how this doesn't comport with the public interest?

< Message edited by cloudboy -- 8/3/2008 7:32:12 AM >

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RE: The Walmart Endorsment - 8/3/2008 7:32:11 AM   
lighthearted


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Status: offline 		I guess it would depend on the company.  I have no experience in organizing labor organizations, only in being part of one, and being harassed by another.

I'm adding this after your edit:  I don't think that being locked into low wages and benefits by an organization that is supposed to be on your side is the answer either.  my point is that unions no longer have the bargaining power they once did.

< Message edited by lighthearted -- 8/3/2008 7:34:19 AM >

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RE: The Walmart Endorsment - 8/3/2008 7:53:12 AM   
slaveboyforyou


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quote:

Look at the facts: look here at numbers 23-25 and 26-29? The Waltons have gotten rich by fucking their employees. How could anyone with a soul so enrich themselves and not pay better wages to their own workforce?


What facts on the list you linked to prove that the Waltons "have gotten rich by fucking over their employees?"  You didn't list any facts; you're just parroting what every Wal-Mart hating lefty says.  Sam Walton got rich by providing retail stores in small towns and rural areas.  He built that company up from a small general store right here in Arkansas.  The company he founded spread out into other markets and it's been successful.  The people employed by Wal-Mart make the same wage they'd make working at K-Mart, Sears, Target, Home Depot, etc, etc. 

The labor unions are pissed off because they aren't getting their cut.  Labor unions have devolved into nothing more than organized, legal extortion rackets.  Spare me this bullshit about them caring about the working man. 

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RE: The Walmart Endorsment - 8/3/2008 8:44:17 AM   
bipolarber


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Status: offline 		Hummm... I wonder if Wal Mart employees will vote for Obama... apparently, Wal Mart circulated a memo nationwide a week ago, that essentially said, "you will vote republican, or else!"

Combine that with the report of the woman who was brain damaged while at work for Wal Mart, and how the company attempted to take away her benefits... They only backed off after it became a national news story about how WalMart was fucking over a disabled gold star mother...

Yeah, Wal Mart is evil.
I try to stay away from buying from them wherever possible.
Fuck WalMart, and fuck anyone who would accept their endorsement.

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RE: The Walmart Endorsment - 8/3/2008 9:24:33 AM   
Alumbrado


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quote:

... apparently, Wal Mart circulated a memo nationwide a week ago, that essentially said, "you will vote republican, or else!"


And WalMart would know which lever one of their employees pulled inside the voting booth exactly how?

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RE: The Walmart Endorsment - 8/3/2008 10:32:56 AM   
Termyn8or


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Status: offline 		bipolar, I heard about that case quite some time ago. Because she won a lawsuit they wanted the insurance money that had paid her hospital bills back. That would have taken almost all the money. The company that insured the truck that hit her paid out the maximum limit of liability, and then they want their money back leaving almost nothing for her required ongoing care. That's the good hands people for ya. They are worse than banks.

And just so y'all know, I ain't voting. I don't care who gets in because it will be business as usual. I'm sick of the whole thing.

I have only set foot in a Walmart one time, and that was for an eye exam. Right after the big blackout I needed a pair of glasses, and I didn't even get them from Walmart, I only went there because Eyemasters did not have on optometrist on duty. I took the prescription there and got my new glasses the same day. I must admit it was a thourough exam, but I doubt the people were really working for Walmart. Most likely they just paid their rent and a portion of their profits.

If you read AFP you can find out alot more about how Walmart is. And if you do, you will most likely avoid them like the plague. But alot of people won't because the sheeple need instant gratification, they can't wait. And that, my friends, is one of the core problems in this country. Walmart would not exist if the sheeple refused to buy Chinese shit.

But they can't, they have to have it now. I want I want I want. I actually threatened the olman that if he started one more sentence with 'I want' that I would have to kill him. The words 'I want" personify the US, and of that, I am very ashamed. I would like to think we are better than that. But no, instead we ruin ourselves and send all kinds of money to about five people in China. I am not talking about you or me, but collectively US citizens, we have no morals, no foresight, and very little intelligence regardless of skill or income level.

T

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RE: The Walmart Endorsment - 8/3/2008 12:00:11 PM   
christine1


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Status: offline 		gosh, i hope the price of walmarts frozen strawberries don't go up if mccain wins....and don't even get me started if their pork rinds go up in price.

edited because i could.

< Message edited by christine1 -- 8/3/2008 12:02:01 PM >

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RE: The Walmart Endorsment - 8/3/2008 12:07:14 PM   
Sanity


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You might want to edit it again real quick because it's Obama who would (supposedly) push hard to drive Walmart prices up.


quote:

ORIGINAL: christine1

gosh, i hope the price of walmarts frozen strawberries don't go up if mccain wins....and don't even get me started if their pork rinds go up in price.

edited because i could.


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RE: The Walmart Endorsment - 8/3/2008 12:58:12 PM   
cloudboy


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Status: offline 		What's ironic is that Walmart, the world's largest employer, gives its employess substandard wages and benefits while its owners enrich themselves to the tune of $60 Billion Dollars, and then company management worries about the possible unionization of its workforce.

Its kind of like a wife-beater worrying about his wife skipping out on him.

It makes me think of Alexander II. In his famous speech of 30th March 1856, Alexander told the marshals of the nobility of Moscow province that it was better to emancipate the peasants from above than to wait for it to happen from below.

< Message edited by cloudboy -- 8/3/2008 1:15:23 PM >

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RE: The Walmart Endorsment - 8/3/2008 1:14:08 PM   
thishereboi


Posts: 14463
Joined: 6/19/2008
Status: offline 		The only thing I can say at this point is don't shop there and don't get a job there. See how easy that was.

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RE: The Walmart Endorsment - 8/3/2008 1:19:41 PM   
cloudboy


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Yes, but the Walmart model of business has changed the American landscape of retail and manufacturing --- with all cost cutting measures directed against labor.

Walmart's alignment with the Republicans, thereby, delineates the Republican relationship to labor.

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RE: The Walmart Endorsment - 8/3/2008 2:01:43 PM   
slaveboyforyou


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quote:

Yes, but the Walmart model of business has changed the American landscape of retail and manufacturing --- with all cost cutting measures directed against labor.


Cost cutting measures directed toward labor have been around a lot longer than Wal-Mart.  Big box retail stores and job outsourcing have been around a lot longer too. 

quote:

Walmart's alignment with the Republicans, thereby, delineates the Republican relationship to labor. 


The Waltons give money to both Democrats and Republicans, so there is no alignment.  I live in the home state of Wal-Mart, and guess which party is in control of this state?  It's not the Republicans; we've only had 3 Republican governors since Reconstruction and we've never had a Republican legislature.  Guess which former first lady and former Democratic Presidential candidate was on the Wal-Mart board of directors? 

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RE: The Walmart Endorsment - 8/3/2008 3:18:35 PM   
cloudboy


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Did you even read the article in the OP?

I do agree that Walmart is a symptom, not a cause at this point, but it did have a huge impact on retail and manufacturing practices in the USA --- most of which devalued the standing of labor at home and abroad.

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