70% of Food Stamps/Medicaid recipients work full time, new study GAO And more results

[Deja Thoris]

You are correct in that legislation must change to get Walmart paying livable wages.

The point you are incorrect though is your proposed method of not buying at Walmart anymore. How the fuck does that change legislation? And even if you push Walmart out of business (not happening in towns where Walmart destroyed everything else) another company will do the very same. Because they can. Because legislation doesn't magically change when Walmart dies.

I don't think I really expect people to stop shopping at places like that. I'm just surprised that most people can't link their purchasing choices to some of the bad things happening in the world. They will buy the cheapest piece of clothing and then claim outrage over child labour, they will buy non sustainably bought fish and cry about dolphins dying in dragnets in nets and so on and so on.

Again, I'm not surprised these "bad" things happen. It's inevitable. It's that people manage to disassociate themselves from it as if they were wholly innocent. The correct response to this (to me) is to consider my purchasing habits etc and see how I can affect change with my pocket or vote, not to vilify Walmart and Amazon for being efficicient.

And yes, I think the answer to a lot of this stuff is legislation because otherwise people without scruples will always do something dangerous or unethical etc to make a buck.

[Ivanstone]

You are correct in that legislation must change to get Walmart paying livable wages.

The point you are incorrect though is your proposed method of not buying at Walmart anymore. How the fuck does that change legislation? And even if you push Walmart out of business (not happening in towns where Walmart destroyed everything else) another company will do the very same. Because they can. Because legislation doesn't magically change when Walmart dies.

What are you're talking about is impossible!

[JohnBrown1917]

I don't think I really expect people to stop shopping at places like that. I'm just surprised that most people can't link their purchasing choices to some of the bad things happening in the world. They will buy the cheapest piece of clothing and then claim outrage over child labour, they will buy non sustainably bought fish and cry about dolphins dying in dragnets in nets and so on and so on.

Again, I'm not surprised these "bad" things happen. It's inevitable. It's that people manage to disassociate themselves from it as if they were wholly innocent. The correct response to this (to me) is to consider my purchasing habits etc and see how I can affect change with my pocket or vote, not to vilify Walmart and Amazon for being efficicient.

And yes, I think the answer to a lot of this stuff is legislation because otherwise people without scruples will always do something dangerous or unethical etc to make a buck.

And again, you're ignoring that to a lot of people, wallmart is the only place they can shop at. So just stop buying food, how the fuck is that the solution?

[Endus]

And again, you're ignoring that to a lot of people, wallmart is the only place they can shop at. So just stop buying food, how the fuck is that the solution?

It's a circle that feeds itself.

Pay your employees so poorly they're barely scraping by and have to cut costs everywhere to make it through the month.
Offer your products are the cheapest, exploitative prices possible, which those workers have to purchase because they can't afford to make more-conscientious decisions.
Repeat ad infinitum as the rich get richer and everyone else gets fucked.

You can't solve the problem by asking the poor to make more-expensive choices. You need to attack the problem by attacking the actual cause; exploitative capitalist systems.

[Deja Thoris]

You aren't a big picture person are you comrade?

[JohnBrown1917]

You aren't a big picture person are you comrade?

I'm not the one who is critical about people for choices they do not have.

[Fugus]

I'm not the one who is critical about people for choices they do not have.

As someone who remembers when Walmart first opened up around here. Originally, they offered great jobs with great wages and great prices. I worked at JiffyLube at the time and we were even losing managers to their tire center because they were paying more. So naturally they got mountains of business.

Then as the local places largely closed down and they shut down their competition, THEN their claws came out, their wages died, their hours died, and their prices creeped up some where many times it would be cheaper to other online and pick up at the store than to order at the store.

I ended up having to work there for a bit about a decade later. There were people there who hadn't got raises in years because they put in wage caps, they cut hours, and I worked 3rd shift where they fired between half and a third of the shift in waves every 6 months. The fight for $15 is the only thing that actually forced them to start raising their wages originally.

This is one of those situations where the populace largely isn't educated enough on every issue to make informed choices in the moment and when you are in a situation where you are doing what's right while the rest are doing what's easy and cheaper for them in the moment, you are the one taking the loss.

This is one where the fix has to come from people with authority over those companies, and that isn't the consumer directly.

[Zan15]

debt is not a bad thing though . it always existed - since the first hard farmer in ancient mezopotamia had more grain then he could eat and "lend some" to lazy drunkard neighboor who was to lazy to work but otherwise would starve with he promist that next season he would get 2xback : (ye ye i know childrens tale - but describes where barter came from)

it fuels the market and gives people jobs.

as long as its kept in check .

.

i think 150-200 trillion in current a future unpayable debt burden left after boomers die...is quite the "check" breaker

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Everyone has had a hand in the mess we're in.

You harp on Walmart, yet it was founded by a non-boomer, and it's CEO is currently a non-boomer. Same goes for McDonald's.

Do I need to list off a list of scummy "me-first" non-boomer CEO's? Because it's not hard.

Brushing off boomers as selfish is no different from brushing off millennials as self-entitled whiners.

There is no defining trait of a generation. Do you honestly think that as soon as the boomers retire that all the corporations are going to magically become benevolent?

LOL the ceo is off by 1 year...Mcd by 2...giggles.

no one said it was exclusive to boomers, just they were the substantial portion of it and started the trend.

Also no one was talking about poor Sam, i said his 5 children and grandchildren who really control walmart not the CEO. At any point that family can exert their will on Walmart and make anything happen

I don't believe it will change because boomers made it standard. it will take generations to change that kind of behavior

It's also basic fact it will get better because baby boomers are an abnormal blip in birth rates that put an strain on the whole system because they and their parents made sure they would not have to foot the bill for their own benefits.

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Not my problem if you don't understand how a lot of people shopping at wallmart have no choice, maybe if you continue to defend them, its CEO will give you a raise!

can you give me an example of a small town with just a walmart and nothing else?

[JohnBrown1917]

i think 150-200 trillion in current a future unpayable debt burden left after boomers die...is quite the "check" breaker

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LOL the ceo is off by 1 year...Mcd by 2...giggles.

no one said it was exclusive to boomers, just they were the substantial portion of it and started the trend.

Also no one was talking about poor Sam, i said his 5 children and grandchildren who really control walmart not the CEO. At any point that family can exert their will on Walmart and make anything happen

I don't believe it will change because boomers made it standard. it will take generations to change that kind of behavior

It's also basic fact it will get better because baby boomers are an abnormal blip in birth rates that put an strain on the whole system because they and their parents made sure they would not have to foot the bill for their own benefits.

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can you give me an example of a small town with just a walmart and nothing else?

https://money.com/walmart-stores-closing-small-towns/

[Zan15]

https://money.com/walmart-stores-closing-small-towns/

you got a town name or you going to randomly post stories?

Hey i got one for you!!
Look at Westport NY.

A non-walmart supermarket opened and now you have to drive 25 miles to get to another supermarket. Of course they always just had one supermarket, but lets shovel hate on that new supermarket!!!


my small town has a walmart and a new grocery store just opened up last year!! Hell the shop rite is just about done as well.

i remember years back this being a thing and every time i looked it ended up being a small town that only had 1 "store" prior to walmart coming in and they just replaced it. they didn't actually kill competition they were the competition.

Most of these "mom and pop" stores were so poorly run that they had to milk their customers to make a profit. Once you had a corporate machine like walmart that came in there was no way they could compete because they could no longer rip people off.

[JohnBrown1917]

you got a town name or you going to randomly post stories?

Suit yourself if you want to bootlick Wallmart so badly you're just going to ignore that some towns only have 1 grocery store.

[Easo]

nowadays people are lazy and want everythign instantly and for free.


uff thanks god i live in socialistic EU - when starting my side business i got 35k non-returnable grant even though i didnt really need it but hey its free money (from my previously paid my taxes ) didnt have to ask parents even for one cent

Oh shut the fuck up. Just common, stop beating around the bush and admit it that the whole issue is that you don't want OTHERS to have something granted. It is not about being lazy, it is about others having something by default. Because obviously to you it seems fine that full work week does not pay enough to live.
You also seem incapable of understanding any further implications from that, starting from mental health to public image of a city. And those go really far.

Which part of the EU, you genius? Tell me, because for sure Baltics don't have it. This just screams how small your whole world is, you literally live in a bubble I guess...

i wonder where does this notion comes from that people should work 40 hours a week and not a single hour more ? especially when they just start their carrier - seemed always dumb to me.

Because fucking smarter people than you agreed on that after centuries of experience observing results from work?! Have you never questioned why most of the world works 5x 8h per week? Have you never ever read anything about human productivity??? Or about the latest experiments about 35 hour work week?
Are you a child? Why do you have dificulties understanding basic things?

And fucking finally - everyone cannot be a manager or a business owner. Someone has to do the basic, dirty work too, someone has to stock the shelves, clean streets, lay bricks, etc. All you are arguing about is why should the basic workforce (without which none of the big corpos would ever exist at all) be paid a livable wage.
At least try to ponder about it.

[Gestopft]

Most of these "mom and pop" stores were so poorly run that they had to milk their customers to make a profit. Once you had a corporate machine like walmart that came in there was no way they could compete because they could no longer rip people off.

I'm sure there's some truth to that in plenty of cases, but don't ignore economies of scale, vast supply chains, loss leader pricing, and the various other advantages and tools that make them incredibly difficult to compete with- even by well managed stores.

[Zan15]

I'm sure there's some truth to that in plenty of cases, but don't ignore economies of scale, vast supply chains, loss leader pricing, and the various other advantages and tools that make them incredibly difficult to compete with- even by well managed stores.

Sure, of course.

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Suit yourself if you want to bootlick Wallmart so badly you're just going to ignore that some towns only have 1 grocery store.

Ya i didn't think you had actual examples, you were just generalizing and exaggerating.

Odd, after authoring this thread....and my comments, you think i am "bootlicking".

yikes, you be embarrassing yourself son

[Krastyn]

LOL the ceo is off by 1 year...Mcd by 2...giggles.

Either they are part of the generation or they aren't. The line needs to be drawn somewhere. You completely glossed over the fact that both were started by non-boomers, and experienced their growth, under non-boomers.

You know why most CEO's are boomers? because most CEO's of established companies are 55+.

no one said it was exclusive to boomers, just they were the substantial portion of it and started the trend.

Again, you're using some mighty fine rose-colored glasses there. The post-war boom that created boomers, created this. You have a hatred for them because they're currently "in charge". If you think this profit-driven excess is somehow a recent trend, you've been ignoring the last half-century.

I don't believe it will change because boomers made it standard. it will take generations to change that kind of behavior

Greed has existed since humanity has existed. This isn't a recently learned behavior.

It's also basic fact it will get better because baby boomers are an abnormal blip in birth rates that put an strain on the whole system because they and their parents made sure they would not have to foot the bill for their own benefits.

It is far, far from a basic fact. People in general, not just boomers, have a very hard time thinking long term. It's not just a boomer thing.

Look at SkiptheDishes, DoorDash, Uber, Lyft, and such. Are those the fault of the boomers? Yet all of them are detrimental to their workers and businesses in the name of "convenience" for consumers.

[Cthulhu 2020]

https://money.com/walmart-stores-closing-small-towns/

I live in a very liberal city of about 140k population. A Wal Mart was going to open up right next to our downtown, which is a hub of small businesses. The Wal Mart was boycotted so hard that they eventually closed it down due to a lack of business as well as push back from the local politicians. Funny how liberal cities tend to be thriving, bustling hubs of small businesses, and it's the podunk nowhere conservative towns that see Wal Marts plop down that force small businesses to close, because everyone starts shopping at the Wal Marts.

Your posts so often lack in context and heavily rely on projecting conservative practices onto liberals. I do have a Wal Mart near me but the only times I've ever shopped there was for midnight releases of physical Collector's Editions of games, and the only alternative to Wal Mart for those was places like Game Stop which isn't exactly a local small business.

Your posts hilariously accuse liberals of these biases or hypocrisy and yet you have no real proof or reason to believe that the people you're accusing of such things actually do what you say they do.

[JohnBrown1917]

I live in a very liberal city of about 140k population. A Wal Mart was going to open up right next to our downtown, which is a hub of small businesses. The Wal Mart was boycotted so hard that they eventually closed it down due to a lack of business as well as push back from the local politicians. Funny how liberal cities tend to be thriving, bustling hubs of small businesses, and it's the podunk nowhere conservative towns that see Wal Marts plop down that force small businesses to close, because everyone starts shopping at the Wal Marts.

Your posts so often lack in context and heavily rely on projecting conservative practices onto liberals. I do have a Wal Mart near me but the only times I've ever shopped there was for midnight releases of physical Collector's Editions of games, and the only alternative to Wal Mart for those was places like Game Stop which isn't exactly a local small business.

Your posts hilariously accuse liberals of these biases or hypocrisy and yet you have no real proof or reason to believe that the people you're accusing of such things actually do what you say they do.

What the hell does that have to do with anything I said? The fuck? Where was I even talking about Liberalism? What the fuck does it matter whether a town is 'liberal' or 'conservative'? Is it a choice what town you're born in now?


I mean, sure, big bussineses trive in liberal countries, but that had nothing to do with my point of how not everybody has a choice to what store they shop at. You can believe in the free market all you want, but it does always work like you think it does.

[Krakan]

I think most of this stems from people being intellectually dishonest with themselves.

You will always have a bottom rung of society and no amount of legislation will correct that. If you raise wages rent and necessities will raise at a near equal pace as the availability of resources remain unchanged.

People always talk about taxing the rich as though it was some bizzare magical bullet while always excluding themselves from any negatives such a drastic change would have.

It just comes off as naive and hallow to me. A worker sells his labor he alone decides what he will charge for it not a corporation.

[Dontrike]

You will always have a bottom rung of society and no amount of legislation will correct that. If you raise wages rent and necessities will raise at a near equal pace as the availability of resources remain unchanged.

Question, if companies decided that everyone should only make $0.50 an hour would prices for everything go down? Remind yourself that even though wages have been mostly stagnant things still go up in price and wages are not keeping up with it. When gas prices go up you'll see the excuse "well it costs more to get that stuff here" but when gas prices go down does the cost of those goods? No, they don't.

If I have to pay an extra 15 cents for a burger just so the person making it doesn't have to work three jobs I think I'll find a way to live with that.

[Howel]

You will always have a bottom rung of society and no amount of legislation will correct that. If you raise wages rent and necessities will raise at a near equal pace as the availability of resources remain unchanged.

So how come currently, and for the last two decades, rent has continuously risen, as median income has been relatively flat, and low income is even worse off?

Could it possibly have something to do with those who do earn more than the median, are earning more at a more rapid pace; and that their rentals are subsequently raised in value, which in real estate means that everything surrounding it also has to be raised?

People always talk about taxing the rich as though it was some bizzare magical bullet while always excluding themselves from any negatives such a drastic change would have.

It is usually raising taxes on those who earn quite a lot. Something that has seen almost nothing but a decline for the last 60 years. Which also, those taxation rates have existed before, and the country somehow wasn't ruled by marauding gangs and Mad Max life style.
So you know... Drastic changes? What, we might lose the hollow enjoyment off seeing one less expensive sports car on roads? Not entirely sure what those changes would be.

It just comes off as naive and hallow to me. A worker sells his labor he alone decides what he will charge for it not a corporation.

Speaking about naïve