1/29/2005

When Wal-Mart Comes to Town

In an article called "When Wal-Mart Comes to Town" it gives some interesting figures to what happens when Wal-Mart comes to town. It said that stores within a 20 mile radius of 14 Wal-Mart's studied saw sales decrease by 25.4% after five years from when Wal-Mart moved in. Even in our little town of Cedar City you can see where all the business is, and its not downtown. Almost all could relate to the zoo-like atmosphere that Wal-Mart has on a Saturday or Sunday afternoon. It's amazing to see all the people that flock to Wal-Mart to do business. We've all heard about the town meetings that have been held to fight Wal-Mart from coming to towns, and also all the heart breaking stories of mom and pop stores with great history going broke in a matter of months because of Wal-Mart. It's tiring to hear how bad Wal-Mart is. This is nothing more than the growing pains of economic progression. We are not forced to do business with Wal-Mart; we go there willingly because we get more "bang for the buck". It won't be long until we see another "Wal-Mart like" corporation come up the ranks to provide something better to the consumer. It's just economic progression! We're all better off in the end because of it!

1 comment:

Dr. Tufte said...

-1 for spelling mistakes in Harry's, Rex's, and Marie's comments (waived)

What everyone is sensing in this discussion is that their consumer surplus is larger when they shop at Wal-Mart.

By definition, profits are what owners don't "share" with their employees (profit-sharing being somewhat of a misnomer). And, last I checked, owners are not required to "share" profits, since they bear more risk than the workers do.

LOL Chuck. Rent "What's Eating Gilbert Grape" for the movies perspective on that feeling.