4/07/2005

Unions and Communities Vs. Wal-Mart

Wal-Mart has become such a retail "powerhouse" lately that many unions and communities have taken opportunity to battle against it. We see on the news towns and groups that try to prevent the "monster" from entering into their humble towns. It's image has also been degraded because of the claims of worker discrimination and anti-union practices. But Wal-Mart, being set-off by lawsuits and claims of uncompetitive practices, tried to step up and repair this tarnished image on Tuesday. The media was invited and brought journalists to Rogers, Ark., Wal-Mart's headquarters, in a first-ever media event. Wal-Mart, whose annual sales of $256 billion (the equivalent of Austria's GDP), also planned to give reporters a rare peek at some of its operations. Being tipped off on it, a labor union and other groups used the event to publicize complaints and make their voices known in Wal-Mart's hometown of Bentonville in northwest Arkansas. What a battle.

4 comments:

Eric said...

Wow I don’t want to say that Wal-Mart is always 100 percent completely innocent. But I remember when Wal-Mart came to my little town in North Eastern Utah people were ecstatic! I don’t think that feeling for me has gone away I love Wal-Mart it’s the coolest. Why would anyone try to prevent such a good thing such as convenience and low prices from coming to town? Doesn’t sound like the democracy I know.

Eric said...
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Eric said...
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Dr. Tufte said...

-1 on Eric's comment for spelling errors.

Is there actually any economics in this post Fred?

BTW: It is common, but deeply inappropriate to compare the sales of a firm to the GDP of a country. GDP is a value added concept. The appropriate comparison is value added by the firm to GDP of a country. The former is usually in the range of 3-10% of sales.