Riddle me this

[xoxoxoBruce]

Originally Posted by wolf

Yes, I know that Walmart is frequently accused of making sure employees don't get enough hours to make full time ... but you don't have to work there. Retail is pretty much an open field. There's always the KMart. Or Target. Or the local stupidmarket chain.

Bwahahahahahahahahahaahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.

[wolf]

If that's all you're qualified to do, go do it.

Remember the lesson of the useless telephone sanitizers from Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Here in the Megalopolis that parallels the I-95 corridor, you can’t swing a dead cat without hitting a mall, mini-mall or shopping center. But as you head west the stores thin out faster than good radio stations and they’re getting thinner every day.

An Iowa State University study said, 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. It’s hardly confines to Iowa either, it’s everywhere. Ask Case how many retail jobs are available in her area.

“you don't have to work there. Retail is pretty much an open field. There's always the KMart. Or Target. Or the local stupidmarket chain.”

That is not really true in most areas.

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. According to government reports, the average pay at Wal-Mart is $8.23 an hour — $2 less than standard retail industry pay.

The result is a lot Wal-Mart workers not being able to afford the health insurance Wal-Mart offers. Even if you can pay, part-time workers, and it does its best to keep as many as possible, part time, must wait two years and cannot add a spouse or children to their coverage. A lot of their people rely on public assistance such as food stamps and health care.

Wal-Mart being the country’s biggest employer leads to bad news for states.
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.

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.

What’s myth, what’s not

Myth: People without health insurance coverage don’t work.
Fact Seventy-five percent live in families where at least one person works full time. Twenty percent live in families that have two full-time workers.

Myth: Most people without health insurance are poor.
Fact Almost 29 million of the uninsured in 2002 had household earnings of at least $25,000. In 2002 the federal poverty guideline for a family of four was $18, 850.

Myth: It doesn’t really matter if a person doesn’t have health insurance.
Fact About 18,000 Americans die each year because they did not seek early medical attention for a treatable illness, due to lack of insurance.

Myth: Most uninsured children live in single-parent households.
Fact More than half live with both parents.

Myth: People who don’t have health insurance simply don’t want to pay for it.
Fact Seventy-five percent of uninsured adults say the main reason they are not insured is they cannot afford the premiums.
Source: CovertheUninsuredWeek.org

And the $20 Billion Wal-Mart brought in from China last year contributed more than a little to the lack of good jobs paying wages that people could raise a family on.

If that's all you're qualified to do, go do it.

Oh, I see. I've got mine, fuck you.
Well a few million of these people could be trained to be proficient in your, or anybody elses, field and then let the bidding begin for who will work for the least compensation. :p

[Troubleshooter]

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

...

Good one Bruce.

I know a lot of college students here work at Walmart and chances are a good number of them will continue to work there when they graduate because it's the best game they know.

It's funny really, they go to school to get a diploma to raise their hiring value and unless they leave town they're still stuck at Walmart because it's the only employer with any turnover. They'll be forever discharging their school loans on what Walmart pays.

[Undertoad]

Don't forget about the evil intarweb taking those retail jobs away.

I bought about $500 online and eBay last two months that would have gone to local places ten years ago. This month I'm planning on spending $3000 in a similar way.

[Trilby]

I recently read an article about Ireland being the richest nation in Europe. They turned it around by offering free college tuition and being friendly to corporations. Dell is their biggest exporter now. I like the free college tuition part. Seems like it works. You've got to give people skills to improve their lot. That's part of being a civilized nation.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

Don't forget about the evil intarweb taking those retail jobs away.

I bought about $500 online and eBay last two months that would have gone to local places ten years ago. This month I'm planning on spending $3000 in a similar way.

You would do that if you could get evrything in a store across the street for the same price with free delivery and a free haircut. :p
I'm talking about normal people that go shopping and you are a self professed anti-socialite.
Truthfully, I do most of my shopping online or by mail also. Always have, but I never claimed to be normal.

I recently read an article about Ireland being the richest nation in Europe.

Boeing sells more planes in Ireland than anywhere else. Leasing companies that rent them to airlines and charter operators.

That's part of being a civilized nation.

You make that sound like it's a good thing. I wouldn't know, having always been an American.

[jaclyn8700]

Originally Posted by jaguar

What it means is you're screwing yourself.


This is the kind of thing that really makes me laugh. Or cry, depending on mood. Look at say, the kafuffle over estate tax, and look at who is affected by that. Or bush's last round of tax cuts that did little for the economy but sure helped some of his mates. Look at the tens of billions of public money effectively siphoned to rich cronies off by untendered contracts over Iraq.

The other thing that halfwits like noodle tend not to take into account is themore recent concept of non metric externalities. People's wellbeing and most forms of environmental damage being the most common two. By exploiting these things you're effectively borrowing against a finite resource you cannot really define or passing the cost silently over to someone else, this doesn't mean there isn't a cost involved. Look at the cost of things like depression on the economy (when they put a vague number or it) or the forecasts for economic damage from the greenhouse effect and it starts to come into focus. There is a vague school involving this called PAE - post autistic economics which has gained some ground but it's effectively fractured and a bit all over the place at the moment, postmodern economics is not very mature yet but needed more than ever in the face of people like noodle.

The minimum wage stops exploitative businesses doing people over even harder than they do at the moment, there is no way to encourage a business to pay more for the same labour, it's not in their interest. People do live on the minimum wage, usually supplemented by a sideline of some sort, take the 'burden' of businesses to pay employees in something other than peanuts fucks over all those people, including particularly vulnerable categories like new immigrants. I suppose environmental law is a 'burden' as well, why not let them dump PCBs into the local ecosystem so they can concentrate on making more environmentally friendly products? Both statements are fucking non sequiturs.

As for your folks social security cheque, this admin is working to stop that as soon as possible.

do your eally think social security will be ended? or are you kidding.

[skysidhe]

Where then are all these mom and pop businesses I should be shopping at?? Wallmart isn't the only company that outsources.

Where is that 'made in America ' label?
http://www.usstuff.com/jacket.htm