They get tax breaks from local communities, often paying no local tax, sell products below cost until the competition goes out of business, mislabel products as 'made in US' when they're imported [not from US territories either], make employees work off the clock, fire employees who want to have a union, and underpay their >employees so badly that many have to apply for food stamps and state health care programs.
Wow, how do they do that? All of my employees are forced to pay union dues, are given no choice about full medical care, pensions, educational benefits, and have guaranteed no layoff contracts. I also make them comply with OSHA standards and cruelly pay for their educations and in fact I force them to sit through required professional training throughout their careers.
I personally supervise their professional development and on numerous occasions make them do stuff like take long, onerous breaks at high class restaurants to eat lunch at my expense. Even though they cry for more I never let them work for more than 37.5 hours a week, except in cases where they bend my arm, and then I'm more than likely to double their wages (which are extremely high to begin with). Occasionally Ben-Hur's galley has to get up to ramming speed, but that's where the training and loyalty pays off. I'd like to see how they do that at Wal-Mart. Every now and then I compel them to accept presents. Even worse, I make it a point to torture them by accomodating their personal lives and maintaining a flexible attitude, which I know is merely an exhibition of weakness. You know, I really wonder how I seem to stay profitable and have zero employee turnover. I really ought to get into a line of work that doesn't really need all these highly skilled career professionals that I'm competing for. I guess Wal-Mart can make it work, after a fashion, but my business model is different. Anyone that deliver the kind of professional levels of expertise and reliability that I'm looking for is welcome to come and compete for the jobs that I probably don't have openings for once every five years or so. Although I usually replace due to promotions, not hiring. I am going to be looking for education, experience, security clearances, long resumes, and suchlike. I haven't got the budget or the headcount to do interns anymore. What disturbs me is that there doesn't appear to be an entry level "middle" sort of job anymore. I started as an operator at the phone company, but I started with a degree in psychology and considerable grad school. I knew that was equivalent to "working in the mailroom" but there was a path to advancement. I'd say that the economy was pretty bad back then, I did some crap jobs too and it's easy to say a job sucks until you haven't got one. That is what Walmart counts on, they'll AWAYS have a work force no matter what. I'm in a position now to not operate that way, but I wasn't always. I don't care for Wal-Mart, and I won't buy there, but it is what it is. ************************************************************************* ** List info, subscription management, list rules, archives, privacy ** ** policy, calmness, a member map, and more at http://www.cguys.org/ ** *************************************************************************
