Comment by oblio
19 days ago
Isn't that as toxic? I've read a bunch about Walmart and the whole thing is basically a scam.
They get a ton of tax incentives, subsidies, etc to build shoddy infrastructure that can only be used for big box stores (pretty much), so the end cost for Walmart to build their stores is quite low.
They promise to employ lots of locals, but many of those jobs are intentionally paid so low that they're not actually living wages and employees are intentionally driven to government help (food stamps, etc), and together with other various tax cuts, etc, there's a chance that even their labor costs are basically at break even.
Integrated local stores are better for pretty much everything except having a huge mass to throw around and bully, bribe (pardon me, lobby) and fool (aka persuade aka PR/marketing).
Integrated local stores are better for pretty much everything except for actually having what you want in stock.
There is a reason why rural communities welcome Wal-Mart with open arms. Not such a big deal now that you can mail-order anything more-or-less instantly, but back in the 80s when I was growing up in BFE, Wal-Mart was a godsend.
This hasn’t changed much. In rural communities there isn’t same day or even over-night Amazon.
It may have shifted where people buy things they can wait for, but for weekly shopping I don’t think it has.
The 80s were 40 years ago, though. Something can outlive its usefulness.
True. A good example being Sears, which should have become Amazon but didn't. Prior to the arrival of Wal-Mart, if you couldn't find something locally (which, again, was true more often than not) your options were to drive 50-150 miles to the nearest large city, or order from the local Sears catalog merchant.
The latter wasn't what most people think of as a Sears store, because the local economy could never have supported such a thing. It was more like a small office with a counter and a stockroom behind it. They didn't keep any inventory, but could order products for pickup in about a week. Pickup, mind you. You still had to drive to town to get your order. As stupid as this sounds, it was 10x worse in person.
So if Wal-Mart didn't exist, it would have had to be invented. It was not (just) a monster that victimized smaller merchants and suppliers, a tax scam, or a plot to exploit the welfare system. It was something that needed to happen, a large gap in the market that eventually got filled.
Nowadays I wouldn't set foot in one, but it was different at the time. I didn't mean to write a long essay stanning for Wal-Mart, but your original post is a bit of a pet peeve.
Local stores are better in many ways, but not the ones consumers care about: price and convenience.
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You forgot the part where nobody wants to shop at local stores and pay twice as much for 1/4 of the inventory.
Walmart spread so successfully precisely because so many people immediately started shopping there for all of the basics.