Average Wal-Mart shoppers know why they patronize the giant retailer. Its low-cost, one-stop shopping can be a lifesaver to cash-strapped families in these tough economic times.
But what many may not realize is this: Wal-Mart’s goods cost them a whole lot more than the sticker price on a jar of pickles once you factor in the corporation’s union-busting, Main Street-killing, supplier-squeezing, low-paying, sweatshop-supporting, Chinese-importing and right-to-work funding policies.
The retailer’s union-busting activities take place on many levels.
It funds right-to-work efforts — Wal-Mart has given cash and the Walton Family Foundation has given multiple grants to the anti-union National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation.
he company arms management with “A Manager’s Toolbox to Remaining Union Free.” Page 1 provides a hot line number under the heading: “When union activity occurs, call ... ” When a manager calls, an anti-union task force is on the job immediately.
Still, the front line of Wal-Mart union busting is with its workers. UAW Local 1748 member Bonita Lewis took a part-time temporary job at Wal-Mart in order to earn some extra money.
n a letter to Solidarity, she wrote: “As part of their interviewing process, they showed two movies. One was about Wal-Mart’s start and general information. The second movie was about unions and why Wal-Mart doesn’t feel they need unions.”
That type of propaganda continues during employment. Lewis said there was an anti-union meeting during her break one day when the manager questioned workers about a video they’d been shown. When one worker responded that he had not been approached by any union organizers, the manager emphasized, “And they won’t!”
The managers’ booklet suggests “one-on-one meetings” as one of the tools to help the store remain union-free.
In the few instances when a union has made some headway, the Wal-Mart response has been to stall negotiations or close up shop. About five years ago, after meat cutters at a Jacksonville, Texas, Wal-Mart voted to unionize, management switched to pre-packaged meats and announced it would not use butchers at any of its stores.
Workers at two Canadian Wal-Marts voted for union representation last year, but no contracts have been negotiated. In February talks broke down at the store in Jonquiere, Quebec. Claiming that union demands would prevent the store from becoming profitable, Wal-Mart announced it would shut down the store.
Union busting is just a part of the Wal-Mart profile. While corporate profits reached $10 billion in 2004, and the Walton family is worth more than Bill Gates and Warren Buffett combined, it continues to be one of the stingiest employers when it comes to pay and benefits. According to government reports, the average pay at Wal-Mart is $8.23 an hour — $2 less than standard retail industry pay.
No wonder so many of its workers can’t afford the health insurance Wal-Mart offers. Even if you can pay, part-time workers must wait two years and cannot add a spouse or children to their coverage. Many of the retailer’s employees must rely on public assistance such as food stamps and health care — further straining our faltering health care system.
In Arkansas Wal-Mart has more children of employees on publicly funded state health care rolls than any other employer. In Connecticut taxpayers annually provide $5 million in health care to Wal-Mart workers — more than to workers in any other company in the state.
A 2002 Georgia survey showed that 10,261 of the 166,000 children covered by the state’s taxpayer-funded PeachCare for Kids insurance program had a parent working at Wal-Mart. That’s 14 times the number for the next highest employer.
In 2004 a University of California at Berkeley Labor Center study found that the reliance of Wal-Mart workers on California public assistance programs cost state taxpayers $86 million each year.
Nationally, taxpayers pay an average of $420,750 each year in social services for Wal-Mart associates for each store with about 200 employees.
It doesn’t end there. In community after community where the retailer has located, local businesses die. No one can match Wal-Mart’s wholesale buying power.
According to an Iowa State University study, in the first decade after Wal-Mart arrived in Iowa, the state lost 555 grocery stores, 298 hardware stores, 293 building supply stores, 161 variety stores, 158 women’s apparel stores, 153 shoe stores, 116 drugstores, and 111 men’s and boy’s apparel stores — all attributed to the Wal-Mart presence.
In a 1994 report, the Congressional Research Service warned Congress that communities need to evaluate the significance of any job gains at big-box stores against any loss of jobs due to reduced business at competing retailers. For every two jobs created by Wal-Mart, a community loses three. And those two new jobs usually pay less than the three that were lost.
To add insult to injury, Wal-Mart is America’s biggest importer from China. In 2004 its $20 billion worth of imports contributed to our record $665.9 billion deficit in trade and services.
It may be a giant, but there is a growing awareness of the true impact of a Wal-Mart economy. More and more communities are questioning the wisdom of changing their zoning and environmental impact laws to attract the giant stores. Citizens of Contra Costa, Calif., rejected a Wal-Mart superstore last year. The same thing happened in the Chicago area. New York City labor unions have come together to fight a proposed Wal-Mart in Queens.
A few weeks ago Wal-Mart paid $11 million to settle charges that it used illegal immigrants to clean its stores. Before that it paid $135,000 to settle child labor violations.
The retailer is currently defending itself in the largest class-action sex discrimination lawsuit in U.S. history. The suit, alleging pay and promotion discrimination, represents 1.6 million women.
Wal-Mart board member Thomas Coughlin recently resigned for allegedly misappropriating corporate expenses. John Plummer, who runs a retail executive recruiting firm in Connecticut, told the Associated Press:
The group “was very incentivized to keep costs as low as possible, which meant violations of ... labor laws and good practices.”
American workers cannot afford to live in a Wal-Mart economy — especially when it’s based on violating labor law.
Two states look at corporate freeloading
Wal-Mart and other big retailers may soon be forced to pay a fairer share for their employees’ general welfare.
A bill nearing approval in the Maryland General Assembly would require organizations with more than 10,000 employees to spend at least 8 percent of their payroll on health benefits — or put the money directly into the state’s health program for the poor.
The bill doesn’t name Wal-Mart, but with 15,000 employees in the state, it is the only company to which the law would apply.
Montana is tired of footing the bill for big-box stores, too. Its legislature is debating a tax on retailers such as Wal-Mart, Target and Costco. The tax — 1 percent for stores with more than $20 million in annual sales, 1.5 percent for more than $30 million and 2 percent for more than $40 million — is intended to offset welfare costs for the retailers’ low-paid employees.
