My basic opposition to shopping at Walmatr due to their labor and purchasing tactics is pretty well documented. This week Forbes and Fortune ran articles about Walmart competitors who pay their employees well, offer higher quality goods, and are assets to communites. Check out Sam's website for more info.
Below is the text of an article detailing Walmart's labor practices...straight from the mouths of current and former employees.
Dispatches from Wal-Mart's Front Lines
By Stan Cox, AlterNet
November 17, 2003
Last spring, I did a little amateur research that illustrated how Wal-Mart's wages can fail to provide for even a rock-bottom living standard – even at Wal-Mart prices. Email responses arrived over the next few days. Among the many colorful "I hate Wal-Mart" messages were notes from some critics who maintained, via arguments worthy of Dr. Pangloss, that the company's wages are just about right, because otherwise no one would work there.
As the article made the rounds of the Internet and some local newspapers, I started receiving emails from Wal-Mart employees. There was a steady stream of messages over the following months, with some arriving as recently as late October.
In relating their stories, past and present employees (er, "associates") sliced right through the abstract talk about supply-and-demand and wage inflation, and offered a good look behind the big yellow Wal-Mart happy face. They all requested that I strip from their quotes any identifying information.
Here are excerpts from what they had to say:
Thank you for bringing Wal-Mart's pitiful hourly wages into the light. Bottom line: Wal-Mart is a great place to shop, it's a great stock to own, but it's a horrible place to work if you're an hourly associate. You will starve financially.
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They tell us all the time that "Our People Make the Difference" and that if wasn't for the employees our store would be nothing. So they give us little food parties and buttons we can collect – to get what? We get all of these facts about how many new stores they are going to build next year – how many more do you need? Why not give back to your employees first, seeing how we make the difference? Then build your stores.
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I have worked for this unappreciative company for two years. Since I graduated high school, I have managed to go from a whopping $6.15 to $6.78, which I will not obtain until August 15.
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I think the whole thing about Wal-Mart being anti-union has a lot to do with the underpaid employees or maybe not, we just might be giving the extra money back to the union, but I don't know a whole lot about unions. Wal-Mart just tells us not to sign anything because they are just after our money.
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The present manager made a comment that all he can control are wages. What that means is that the lower he can keep them, the better the store profit and the greater his yearly bonus.
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From a "greeter":
I have seen single mothers try to stay off welfare and make it on what they make at Wal-Mart and it has made me sick.
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I have been with the company since '96 and have been in management off and on throughout the years. Wal-Mart was once a good company to work for, every year it has continued to get worse. . . I have seen a lot of great associates leave the company due to lack of caring and respect for the individual (as W-M so preaches). Wal-Mart isn't the company it once used to be. It's all about the mighty dollar now, and who cares about the little people?
I have been on food stamps for years and so are many other associates. After being with Wal-Mart for seven years and with all my experience I still can't afford to get off food stamps. I will be starting my new career soon and leaving Wal-Mart.
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Full-time is 28-37 hours generally. They cut hours constantly depending on sales, sometimes as much as two hours a day. On average, the pay increase is 35 cents a year.
It is very difficult at times to live on the earnings. Normal hours would be a blessing as well. Most of us work a different shift daily (7-4, 9-6, 10-7, 11-8, 12-9, 2-11, or 10pm-7am). It can be frustrating especially to those that are married or have children. The divorce rate is extremely high...as well as the turnover rate.
If we are asked to work overtime they do not usually let us keep it. I worked a 12-hour shift one time because they were shorthanded. I was tired and worn out, but I could use the money. The next day when I came into work I was told I would have to come in one hour late, and leave one hour early to get rid of the overtime. I was not happy, but I didn't have any choice. They use us like that constantly always saying we need you, can you help us out, and then when we do it's a slap in our face.
God forbid if you are injured on the job. They do everything they can to force you out and make you quit or just flat out fire you. Their basic belief is that every accident is your fault. If you have one you are forced to go to classes on the weekend for several weeks to learn about safety and write essays on why you were injured. If you do not show up for these classes you can and will be terminated.
Whenever a union rep comes around to the store we are forbidden to even acknowledge him/her. If we are caught speaking to any one of them we are automatically terminated! They basically put down the reason for dismissal as anything they want, to avoid any publicity about the union or Wal-Mart's fight against one. The store constantly has videos and pamphlets about why we would not want a union and why it is so bad to belong to one.
Employees are also constantly bombarded with guilt to give to the Children's Miracle Network, add another $15 a month, then there is the United Way fund that we must sign an agreement on, whether or not we contribute. Most do contribute, due to the encouragement of the management, at about $25 biweekly.
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As a former Wal-Mart worker, it used to make me sick to my stomach when Wal-Mart would pressure the low level, low-paid workers to donate money to Children's Network or United Way, or make the lowest-paid workers take time to do bake sales, etc. for charities... THEN WAL-MART TAKES THE CREDIT.
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My husband, a Wal-Mart Supercenter pharmacist, works six days a week, 10-12 hours a day. He is the only pharmacist employed at this location. When he is at home, he is so exhausted he does little more than sleep and watch some sports on TV. He has been a pharmacist for over 26 years but after just five years of such abuse at Wal-Mart, he is now beginning to suffer the physical results of such daily toil on his body.
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On occasion, day-shift people are placed on temporary duty and not given a shift differential. Some employees are working 7-8 days straight with no overtime pay because of the way the pay week is set up.
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We used to have a nice little town in Bentonville, business in abundance around the square. One by one the shoe shops and dress stores all went under, crippled by the big demon.
There were other stories, too. They came from a cashier who could not get compensation for an injury that was clearly job-related; a former Wal-Mart personnel manager who refuses to shop there, having seen "gross mistreatment" of employees; employees complaining about frequent cuts in hours, often so the store can avoid paying overtime; a mother whose son has found that he can get a day off if his truck breaks down, but not if he's sick; and, finally, one employee who went from $5.25 to more than $13 an hour in five years at Wal-Mart and loves working there!
For one last quote, I'll turn to Wal-Mart's most well-known ex-"associate," Barbara Ehrenreich, who, near the end of her book "Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America," reflected on her experience:
Someone has to puncture the prevailing fiction that we're a "family" here, we "associates" and our "servant leaders," held together solely by our commitment to the "guests." After all, you'd need a lot stronger word than dysfunctional to describe a family where a few people get to eat at the table while the rest – the "associates" and all the dark-skinned seamstresses and factory workers worldwide who make the things we sell – lick up the drippings from the floor: psychotic would be closer to the mark.
Stan Cox is a plant breeder, writer and thrift-store shopper living in Salina, Kansas.
Walmart is a terrible place to work at. I work in softlines and the whole staff treats us like shit. There are usually 2 shifts in softlines 7-4 and 3-11. Okay they are so cheap that they dont want to pay anyone to work 7-4 so therefore when the 3-11 person gets there they have double work from all the returns from earlier in the day. They expect you to put up earlier returns and the ones from the service desk sometimes we have up to eleven buggies of returns, with a manager scream at us telling us that we're not working fast enough. How do they expect one person to put up all the returns, zone, and make sure all the shirts are folded neatly when we have thousands of customers daily. It's impossible for the department to look neat 24 hours a day. And then they only want to pay you $6.25 an hour. Not to mention you never ever get a saturday or sunday off. Every saturday 3-11 every sunday 3-11. I worked on Labor Day, Thanksgiving, and I'm schedule to work Christmas Eve and the day after Christmas. To me if you work on Thanksgiving you should be off on Christmas Eve. Don't you think. People believe me "Wally World" isn't so great after all.
Posted by: none on December 22, 2003 10:57 AMWelcome to Corporate america.... You work In retail Now if you dont like it then find something else to do ... enough said..
Posted by: assholio on April 5, 2004 11:19 PMSo what you're saying is that they should just deal with it? Please. Even in the U.S. workers have rights, at least for now, no matter how low-payed their job is.
Your attitude says that people who don't have the skills, education or opportunity to get better jobs should just suffer, which means you buy into the bullshit idea that your morale value is illustrated by your success and material wealth. this implies that you've never suffered any economic hardship, and thus have little perspective. It also shows great ignorance of the retail industry.
There are plenty of other retailers that treat their employees better than Walmart does. Unfortunately, it's also harder to get those jobs because they have less turnover. The fact of the matter is that the nation's largest employer treats people like dirt and it's labor practices are causing other companies to adopt similar policies to compete.
Posted by: Chris on April 6, 2004 12:05 PMWHAT ON EARTH IS HAPPENING IN THIS COUNTRY???
It is truly about the almighty dollar! The seperation of classes...the rich get richer, the poor poorer. The so-called middle class falling out of existance as they too are finding it hard to survive. If no one complains...pay them as little as possible. No one is complaining because we are all desperate to hold down a job in this day and age. The decline of the family and the fear of not being able to put food on the table is an everyday occurance.
We are shipping jobs out to other countries, yes this has been happening for quite some time. The "unskilled labor", factory workers, does Detroit ring any bells?? Now, large coorperations are taking the jobs of college grads, engineers, computer programmers, technically skilled individuals and many others. These jobs are NOW going to India. Isn't it ironic, the third world country which boasts it's diseased, dying and hungry on the streets now getting all of Americas jobs. Where will we be in the not too distant future? Diseased, dying and hungry on the streets. Who is going to pay for the unemployment checks of all of Americas unemployeed if there is no one left in employment to pay them??
Walmart is only one of the many who are guilty. If we don't start standing up and fighting, we are doomed to the future of poverty and penniless waste. Everyone needs to fight back, write congressmen, write senators. E-mail addresses can be easily found. We don't have to see our dreams become the harsh and cruel truths of our worst nightmeres!
I was beginning to feel sorry for all the Walmart employees, came within an inch of vowing never to shop Walmart again. Then I checked out the rest of this web site......
Anti Bush & Anti white! The credibility of the site diminished as I realized the web site is amuck with LIBERAL hate of america, LIBERAL hate of the white man, and LIBERAL hate of corporations.
Posted by: Jerpal on June 15, 2004 08:35 PMUmmm...which site? Alternet? Sam's site? (www.salvatorefalco.com) or this one? None of these are anti-white or anti-America. I can say all three are generally in favor of limiting corporate power in our society.
The issue of race here puzzles me. Why bring it up? I think you need to be specific if you're going to accuse people of being racist.
yes i worked for walmart in texas for 3 and half years.i never missed work always on time i was there telephone operater,i had been on the telephonrs for 3years,i have always done my job i was never wrote up.being a diebetic i had trouble with my legs when i stand on them a long period.off time i had a small bottle off walmart brand off advil i may go 3 months and never open the bottle all managent knew that i had it there were times when they would ask for a advil,when you work the telephones,you have all kind off people too work that area well the night operater came in and opened my bottle and someone put in my bottle pain killers this girl did not go too the doctor ,she went home and look the pill up in a book.came back too work the next day managent had me in the back room screaming at me and saying that i planted the pills i was not allowed anyone with me during the time they were yelling at me.i kept crying and shaking and telling them that i am a diebetic and i came not take things like that.they suspened me with out pay.they said that i was under intervestion from the main office i ask then then why dont you do a drug test i will take if i am in trouble or you think i plotted pain killers,were the police.they said walmart has there on jury and decides about a associate well they call me in the last day and they fired me saying i planted the pills and that they had statment from all the managers day and night shift that i went too each one and gave them a pill.what is they world comeing too when you fight tooth and nail for you job and they tell all the associates in the store if they call me they would be fired too people i had work with for 3years now they wont call me when it came too court the judge ask why did they fire me ,they said because i lied about the pills the judge ask is the first time you have fire some one over this and they said yes.the jude said that i girl who took the pills too them that she was stealing and did ask me if she could have one. the judge ask where the girl now walmart said that they promote her too managent so got the bad end off the deal i still have bad nightmares over this .and they WON they do not care about you maybe because im in my 50 who know they or evil people and something should be done .people came say how good it is too shop there but if you never work there and see what it all about you have no ideal how evil these people or .
Posted by: stella on July 7, 2004 03:10 PMWalmart is one step away from being the devil. They'll come into a town, and imediately all the small stores are gone. Local drug stores, bait shops, athletic stores, clothing shops, hardware stores, car stereo shops, tire stores, photography shops, and more! And now even gas stations and grocery stores. All gone from your community. Replaced with crappy paid jobs, with zero future. Taco Bell, KFC, and the rest will build right next to them. More junk jobs. Adios local dairy bar. Then they pull out to open a supercenter 20 miles away, leaving behind a festering hole, and a town in shambles. Any of that sound good to you? Is it really that important to save a few bucks? Go in for one item, and come out with a shopping cart full of bargains. You end up buying way more than you needed. It's a lose-lose deal anyway you look at it, and I'm from Arkansas.
Posted by: B J Latting on October 28, 2004 05:15 AMWal-mart is so evil becasue of what it does to local communities. It moves into small communities with the promises of work and low prices on products. Mean while as Wal-mart starts to flourish in the community it kills all the locally owned mom and pop stores. This is so detrimental because of the fact that Wal-mart takes the community's money and then gives nothing back to the community. Certain state taxes cannot be imposed upon walmart because of it not being based out of that state. So none of the profit can be taxed on by the state causing there to be no benifit for the local community. Also none of wal-marts products are made locally like mom and pop stores, there fore again not supporting the local economy. Plus all wal-mart products are made by manufacturing jobs that have been out-sourced to other countries such as India, once again not supporting the United States economy. And not only are these jobs out source, but the factories were these products are being made are sweatshops. They employ small children and women mostly. Women and children are barly paid with little to no benifits and women are given no maternity leave. Sure Wal-mart employes local people but even their workers are treated badly. As of now there are multi-million dollar lawsuits against Wal-mart for unfair treatment to women employees. And finally leaving American consumers with one thought, next time you go to Wal-mart in the persuit of discount prices of products think of the company that you are supporting and what you are supporting. To support Wal-mart is the same as supporting discrimination against women, empovrishment of local and state communities, and the out sourcing of American jobs to foriegn sweat shops.
Posted by: Gloria Denue on January 3, 2005 10:53 PMAs an "associate" at Wally World I totally understand & have experienced the unfair practices against women in general. I'm ready to quit. I was on the night shift @9.40 an hour, after 6-7 months I couldn't sleep during the day. I would go in to work on 1-4 hours of sleep for a 9-10 hour shift. Working nights you are not guaranteed an 8 hour shift, you are there till the job is done. We had a new assistant manager come on who loved to cow & backstab associates (power went to his head)thought he had to impress someone higher up. I asked 4 times to go to days because I was so exhausted. Anyone in management that I asked just kept putting me off. I finally went to days @8.40 an hour on the grocery side for 2 months. Then they put me in the bakery 11am-8pm & lowered my pay to 8.24 because no one had shown me how to make a donut (which we don't do in the afternoon) When I questioned that I was shushed like it was a big secret. So they lowered my pay because no one will take the time to show me how to do something that we don't do anyway....????? Welcome to Wal-Mart
Posted by: Associate on February 22, 2005 01:19 PMHI I AM CURRENTLY AN ASOCIATE AT THE WONDERFUL WALLY WORLD. I HAVE BEEN THERE FOR THREE YEARS AND ALL THREE HAVE BEEN HELL. IN THE BEGINNING THEY TALK YOU UP LIKE THERES SO MUCH OPPOURTUNITY WITH THERE COMPANY WHICH WE ALL KNOW IS BULL SHIT. I'VE HAD NO OPPOURTUNITY! I GUESS IF YOUR NOT AN ASS KISSER YOU DON'T GET ANYWHERE WITH THIS COMPANY. AFTER THREE YEARS YOU WOULD THINK YOU COULD GET A DECENT SCHEDULE,BUT ISN'T THAT NOT THE TRUTH THEY COULD CARE LESS WHAT YOU WANT.I JUST TOOK MY WEEKS VACATION AND KNOW THE STUPID MANAGER PUT ME ON FOR 10 DAYS STRAIGHT HOW ABOUT THAT. WHAT A VACATION! THERE MANAGEMENT IS TERRIBLE THEY DON'T LISTEN OR CARE. ALL THEY DO IS TALK CRAP AND DO NOTHING. IM TIRED AND HOPE TO BE OUT OF THERE SOON..WHERE ARE THE EMPLOYEE'S RIGHTS
Posted by: Cher on February 22, 2005 08:51 PMwalmart now has computer sceduling you work what it says or you get no hours they say if you can not work what the computer schedules you just turn in an availabilty sheet once you do that THE COMPUTER SCDEULES YOU NO HOURS ...so you CAN NOT ASK FOR A CERTAIN DAY OFF GOT A SICK MOM NEED ACERTAIN DAY OFF TO BAD PUT THAT SHEET IN NO HOURS FOR YOU NEXT TIME ....LIKE A NAZI WAR CAMP WALMARTS WAY OR NO WAY BUT THEY SAY THERE PEOPLE MAKE THE DIFFERNCE HUH WE ARE JUST A # IN A COMPUTER THEY HAVE NO TIME TO CARE WHO NEEDS WHAT
Posted by: do not want to give on March 1, 2005 05:55 PMI also agree with you im a cashier there and the management treats us like dogs. Like we are not aloud to have a life besides walmart.And after one year i have not gone nowhere with the company. God forbid if you have to change your avaliblity for any reason brecause they will only give you the left over hours. from 16hrs a week to 20. Thankyou for your time
Posted by: shanny on April 6, 2005 12:24 PM