Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price

This movie presents information available from other sources. Yet the way it's shown here is still compelling. The overall impact is powerful. The movie is worth watching. Most disturbing are the types and numbers of crimes committed in Wal-Mart shopping lots, aided by lack of security. Shoppers could be protected but that would cost money ...

There's a glaring omission. Wal-Mart gets its main strength from us, the consumers. That point is made eloquently in South Park's episode "Something Wall-Mart This Way Comes" (season 8, episode 9, Nov 2004). Another good critique is PBS's Frontline in "Is Wal-Mart Good For America?"

If we didn't shop there, there would be changes. We get what we pay for.

Rating: WWW (Well Worth Watching)

I had a generally low opinion of WalMart before, and Brave New Films' documentary only made them seem worse, but I still have questions. WM is well known for persistent, and often illegal, anti-union activity, which is reported in this film. WM is also known for beating down prices, which is not reported. I didn't know that WM has high turnover, or that many stores are purposefully under-staffed.

The sad stories of the losing competitors do not sway me. Mom and Pop operations of all kinds have been giving way to big box operations for many decades. Olive Garden killed my favorite local Italian restaurant, Lowe's is killing my favorite local hardware store and a planned Home Depot will finish the job. That is just competition in the developed world.

What annoyed me were the subsidies and tax breaks that WalMart manages to get from localities. In one case a WM is shown skipping across the town line, abandoning the subsidized big box stores, just before their sales taxes kick in. But more annoying was a lack of perspective: How many big chains and franchises get subsidies? If many do, that would be the logical counter-argument, so I'd like to have gotten the information.

I was also annoyed that WM employees were on public assistance of some kind, but again: How common is this in retail? Do KMart employees get a lot of public assistance? Or not? Apparently there is a lot of crime in WM parking lots. Is there less crime in Walgreen lots, or more? Brave New Films doesn't say. WM sells products from Chinese sweatshops. Hey, even I know they aren't the only ones. WalMart's habit of stockpiling lawn products in the parking lot often leads to toxic runoff, but they aren't the only ones that do that, either.

I still think that WalMart is a very bad employer, and now I know how much of a drain they are on the local economy, but I think Brave New Films failed to demonstrate whether WalMart is all that much worse than the other businesses on the strip, or simply the biggest of a bad lot. Either way, that would be good to know.

There are some "viewer posts" on this site that are fake. Someone at WalMart's rapid response team is posing as a Wal Mart employee, and providing facts regarding how wonderful Wal Mart is.

One fact I know is that COST PLUS pays its employees a respectable wage, and WAL MART does not. In one study, WAL MART's SAM'S CLUB STORE was found to pay its employees A $11.52 per hour, while COSTCO paid its employees $15.97, 40% Less. (Source: Business Week Online April 12, 2004)

Note: I am NOT associated with any business, labor group, political party, association, or group of any kind. I'm just sick of WAL MART paying its employees disgusting wages, and then paying politicos big money to provide RAPID RESPONSE PUBLIC RELATIONS sound bites, attempting to defend the indefensible. They should start by not lying about who them are, when they post submissions on IMDb.

Trust me, I work there; they have---if you can believe it---gotten WORSE for the workers. They recently (within the last 2 months) changed our dress code---no hats (not so bad), everybody has to wear a blue clone shirt (a little bit worse), no more vests (so we have find other ways to carry the tools required for our job), and, just a couple days ago, no radios on the floor, which have been allowed ever since I started working there over 2 years ago. Also, within the last 2 months (this is the worst), they have decided we need to be to be timed on how long long it takes the stockers to work their freight. I mean, c'mon already, this is WAL_MART---not Ford Motor Company!!! If you want me to do piece work, then pay me piece work rate, not less than $10 an hour. Yup, Wal*Mart's lowering prices, alright---lowering the price they pay their employees (oops, sorry---ASSOCIATES).

I saw this tonight in a screening at our local community college with the producer present. It was a huge, standing room only crowd, and it was clearly a hit with the viewers. Producer Robert Greenwald uses an interesting device of running a rah-rah speech of WalMart's CEO at a company meeting, with the CEO bragging about all of WalMart's great policies towards employees, the environment, customers, etc., alternated with clips of dozens of ordinary people testifying to quite the opposite. The stories of small town businesspeople having to close their family stores were especially poignant, as well as the interviews with exploited overseas workers in Walmart's sweatshops. Even one of the company's plant inspectors said he just cried when he went back to his hotel after his first inspection.

Full of astounding facts about the true costs of WalMart, the over two billion dollars it has cost US taxpayers in subsidies, welfare programs for underpaid employees, etc. It became very clear that, whether or not you shop there, it's costing you money, money that's going right into the pockets of the Walton family. It's costing all of us our way of life.

Quite an eyeopener. I, for one, plan to never patronize WalMart again.