I assume you are drunk.

You have to admit, though, that those box stores have annihilated the suburban community mall, the only real vestige of shared space that once existed in the suburbs. Maybe it's irreparable, and maybe there's a net benefit, but it's still a huge loss.

I don’t buy clothes there myself, save for the odd T-shirt or underwear, but you can make the obligatory snide suggestion that I do if it makes you feel superior. Mask your arrogance in a fashionable concern for the working poor if you wish. But don’t act so surprised when someone calls you on it.

***
You claim to come by this belief honestly, you say?

"Studies of Wal-Mart show consumers benefit from lower costs. A 2005 Washington Post story reported that "Wal-Mart's discounting on food alone boosts the welfare of American shoppers by at least $50 billion per year."[101] A study in 2005 at Massachusetts Institute of Technology measured the effect on consumer welfare and found that the poorest segment of the population benefits the most from the existence of discount retailers"

Both quotes from Wiki.

Selling affordable products to poor people is 'bad capitalism'? I have never understood why Wal-Mart gets all the venom. I understand that WalMarts have some negative aspects but they also have positives, which no one ever seems to mention.

It's remarkable how attitudes have changed about mass merchandising over time. In the early 60s, President Kennedy celebrated supermarkets, saying they "…have enabled a higher standard of living and contributed importantly to our economic growth."

And honestly, I think that's why so many people have a hate-on for Wal-Mart. It enables the masses to afford a standard of living that, until recently, was available only to the educated classes. What's a cultured, progressive urbanite to think when he sees bus drivers and waitresses and construction workers carting flat screen TVs out of the store for one third the price he paid not two years ago? He's got to go out and by another new toy just to differentiate himself. Being better than others never used to be such hard work.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Wal-Mar…

You're going to bat for the epitome of bad capitalism, MYL. Much better to save your battered copy of The Wealth of Nations for Zellers, Sears, the Bay, Mark's Work Warehouse, grocery stores, pharmacies, & automotive service centres across the country.

And they won't have to close all of their stores down. Canadian Wal-Mart workers may not be the most highly educated of our workforce, but they're not stupid.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Clara_County_v…

Now all we need to do is organize every WalMart & we can drive them out of business. Not because they can't afford to pay higher wages, but because all the stores are closed.

It is really encouraging though, that the Court did not consider it's opinion to be relevant to the legality of the issue.

I agree about not bribing corporations though. Public money shouldn't be showered on them any more than it should be showered on individuals without some pressing reason concerning the common good.

Minimum wage laws. Work safety laws. Anti-discrimination laws. Paid vacation days regulations. Laws against harassment in the workplace. Employer-contributions to any number of mandatory "benefits."

Competition with other employers. Competition with the generous subsidies of the idle (welfare, EI), old age pensions, old age security, etc..

All of the above give the working poor "a chance" to improve their lot in life. But no. Some schmuck saw hundreds of potential dues-paying suckers and here we are.

But Wal-Mart has every right to close stores in the face of unionization drives, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled today.

There will always be an endless supply of the working poor desperate to stay afloat. The most exploitative and low-paying corporations will always have an endless supply of desperate poor to hire aka – disposable employees.

But it's not fully accurate to say that corporations are just collections of people. There are particular protections for the individuals involved (for example, one can bankrupt their companyy without facing personal bankruptcy). There are certain tax "games' that corportations can engage in – unavailable to individuals (I can't write off the depreciated value of my home computer, for example).

I basically agree with this decision, but I sure wish we'd stop the practice of bribing corporations with taxpayer money, if we're going to let them act like completely autonomous free agents.

That's the thing: these corporations are hardly without social supports. Everything from the roads that let them transport goods, to the various incentives offered by levels of government, to the security in currency, policing, etc. Yes, they pay taxes. And yes, there are protections in law for workers. And yes, in many cases unions have created an insane environment where merit and efficiency are stiffled.

But I guess I have trouble – at least for this particular sector – in casting worker attempts at leveling the playing field a bit as purely selfish, since the employers are hardly self-sustaining free agents.

Hope I'm making sense here – I'm not frothing mad at a failure of a WalMart to unionize or anything. But to ignore (not that you did) that coporations receive considerable benefits from society makes it all to easy to cast unions as completely unfair and counterproductive forces.

Therefore the rights of an individual to make his own business decisions map to corporations. The owners/shareholders (or their delegates the business executives) have the right to keep their business open or close it as they see fit.

Do you seriously think one can live on minumum wage?

Also, I was personally witness to teenagers engaging in very unsafe activities in various stores – all with the knowledge of adult managers. I have been witness to the allocation of shifts being used as an indirect (and weasely) manner of squeezing out staff with backbones.

As for the "more money for less work": one could suggest that represents a balance to the employer's demand of "more work for less money".

I'm not much of union guy, as a general rule. But retail workers tend to be among the least empowered, and the benefits of a union to those workers would hardly be comparable to the largesse seen in other industries, I can assure you.

And would you care to explain how doing away with corporate profits will actually protect jobs? This oughta be good…

That said, we tend to treat retail workers like garbage in our society (as opposed to auto workers, for example, for whom we fork out billions in bribes to the manufacturers).

I'm not sure that trying to stand up for basic working standards – even in the face of jusidictional races for the lowest cost – represents greed. But as I said, many years in retail have coloured my take on this particular industry, so perhaps I'm too biased.

What's sad is that people thought the working poor had a chance…

Non unionized work places in Canada are not similar to third world factories, no matter what you might think. We actually have laws that deal with "decent working conditions" and "a living wage" that are not dependent on whims of companies/unions.