Karen Olsen pulls at our heartstrings using the specific people, places and things that we can possibly relate to in a pathos/ethos type method of description. She pours out examples of infringement, dollar signs, inequality and discrimination. Using names and painting a picture of a subject to explain how [Wal-mart] broke the law using intimidation, denying benefits and firing those that support the union. Sebastian Mallaby rebuttals by using facts and reasoning in a logos/ethos way. Examples include but not limited to; “Wal-mart has a war room to defend its image! Well, yeah, it’s up against a hostile campaign featuring billboards, newspaper ads, and a critical documentary movie.” Mallaby goes on to discuss different ways that many of …show more content…
Where do we as human beings take the responsibility of our part? The word ‘choices’ came to mind as I read both entries. Being that we are adults and have a “right” to ‘choose’ where we work, work where we choose and educate ourselves so we may make a higher pay rate, When does it become the responsibility of the person to make their life what they want it? After reading the entries of both Olsen and Mallaby, I’m finding myself wondering why the employer is being blamed here. Are we not supposed to take charge of our own lives? Making ourselves accountable for our future is the way people were taught as I was growing up. Education, responsibility and accountability were three main words in the vocabulary of many households in my community. Having a place to work was an opportunity. We were not entitled to work for any company. We had to prove ourselves worthy of being employed. Educate ourselves, make responsible choices and continue to be accountable wherever possible is supposed to be what success means. Many countries struggle with poverty and underemployment. Wal-Mart’s ability to give us bottom line pricing is greatly to do with the importation of products from developing countries at a lower cost in shipping as well as production. This is not rocket science for other companies here in America. Wal-Mart would not be the first company to try to pinch a penny by using foreign country products. America itself is doing foreign affairs overseas. This is part of
Wal-Mart, a "Big-Box Retailer" employs more than 2.1 million associates worldwide and has two-thousand seven-hundred stores in the United States with many more in Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Central America, Chile, China, Germany, Japan, Korea, India, Mexico, Puerto Rico, and the United Kingdom, making Wal-Mart the largest retailer in the world. "Wal-Mart accounts for upward of 30 percent of U.S. sales, and plans to more than double its sales within the next five years" (Lynn 29-36). Why is Wal-Mart so successful, and is Wal-Mart actually bad for America?
rose or fell ... But it's clear that average wages fell. (Found off of a website on Google) Walmart workers do not get paid enough money either. The wages that Walmart employers are paid ranges from $7.50-$9.00, and that's even when people have been working there for quite a while. (Found on Google) Wal-Mart wields its power for just one purpose: to bring the lowest possible prices to its customers. At Wal-Mart, that goal is never reached. The retailer has a clear policy for suppliers: On basic products that don't change, the price Wal-Mart will pay, and will charge shoppers, must drop year after year. But what almost no one outside the world of Wal-Mart and its 21,000 suppliers knows is the high cost of those low prices. Wal-Mart has the power to squeeze profit-killing concessions from vendors. To survive in the face of its pricing demands, makers of everything from bras to bicycles to blue jeans have had to lay off employees and close U.S. plants in favor of outsourcing products from overseas. So yes, Walmart is bad for America.
Wal-Mart is one of the largest corporations today in America. It has been changing the lifestyles and economies of both America and China. However, is it good for the economy? You can share either opinion in this matter depending on what your views are on it. I personally believe that it is pulling our economy down with its cheap prices, and at the same time strengthening the economy of a communist country that could be a future threat to this nation; China.
Wal-Mart is good for the economy because of their low prices, every dollar saved by consumers that shop at Walmart lets them buy other items. When prices are lower the consumers’ needs can be more fulfilled rather than when prices are higher. Wal-Marts’ size proves the success of their strategy and also benefits the economy. With Walmart growing into the largest business on the planet it shows that it is accurately fulfilling consumer needs and efficiency. Wal-Mart helps people get more for what they pay for and provides jobs for people willing to work. “It is making suppliers want to achieve greater economies in manufacturing”.
customers unbeatable prices that their competitors find difficult to challenge. But in providing those “great deals” it deducts from other sources. Walmart directly imports from Asia and in turn Asia produces cheaply made items and sells to Walmart for a low cost. Thus,
In Jack and Suzy Welch’s essay they attempt to debunk common myths and assumptions about Wal-Mart because they believe that the company’s success has made it a “fat target for critics who, for reasons of their own, won’t concede how
Environmental Studies is the academic field, which systematically studies human interaction with the environment in which we live in. It is a broad field of study that includes the natural environment, built environment, and the sets of relationships between them. Environmental studies takes into account many different factors that help provide an enjoyable, fruitful way of life, such as national policies, politics, laws, economics, sociology and other social aspects, planning, pollution control, natural resources, and the interactions of human beings and nature.
Since the early ages of man there has always been dominating individuals, people that that are either physically stronger, smarter and/or both, compared to others. It is because of these individuals that the human race has survived. The stronger, smarter individuals became leaders and were the guides for the lesser individuals. As is in the case of Walmart, the world's largest corporation, a dominating leader, in the business of offering consumer goods at low prices. Any leader will come under scrutiny at some point during their rule, so it seems natural that Walmart would. In the past few years, Walmart has been criticized publicly for a number of reasons. Though, as with any negative information ever received, one must always consider
“The need of constantly expanding market for its products chases the bourgeoisie over the whole surface of the globe. It must nestle everywhere,settle everywhere.” Such a statement echos Karl Marx 's fears of the exportation of capitalism and the subsequent importation of capitalistic values. If one were to take into account previous statements of Marx 's work with regards to how the bourgeois find themselves unable to satisfy their hunger for profits, then it comes as no surprise that a corporate entity such as Wal-Mart would also be driven to expand into overseas markets. Wal-mart however does this not by producing high quality and low priced products and importing them into foreign markets. No, as highlighted in the video Walmart takes it a step further by dominating the means of production in foreign markets to reduce costs on overhead. Walmart achieves this of course by taking advantage of international wage labor laws by paying its factory workers only a few dollars a day. For a company like walmart with a net worth of billions dollars the cost of providing a fair wage and benefits to employees at an international and domestic level is insignificant as pointed out in the video. However it matters little to a capitalist powerhouse like walmart that almost exactly mimics Marx 's words. This globalization of capitalism proves to be an economic problem as well as a social problem in the sense it impacts domestic and foreign economies while simultaneously projecting
Working long hours, carrying heavy boxes, low pay, and dealing with irate customers all day sums up the life of a retail employee. As someone that has worked several retail jobs over the last decade, they have all shared this common set of duties. Even speaking with individuals that have worked for different retail companies then I have worked for; they can describe their retail working conditions the same way as I have described them. However, Wal-Mart is the only store that is regularly accused of bullying their employees, and treating them poorly. They are also one of the few stores that promote themselves as a family store across the nation. Wal-Mart has developed a marketing initiative that shows how amazing and wonderful it is to work
More specifically, he discusses impacts including the suburbanization of shopping, the downward trend of local prices, the pressure to lower local wages, the downward pressure on inflation, and a persistent cost scrutiny that is at the root of the entire company. In doing so, Fishman suggests The Wal-Mart Effect is not inherently good or evil as it provides consumers with lower prices but does so by pushing its suppliers to implement extreme measures in order to cut costs. This ability to wield such power derives from the fact that Wal-Mart is simply too great a force to be controlled and does not follow conventional market forces or rules, rather, it makes its own. Ultimately, Fishman concludes by arguing that Wal-Mart itself is also neither good nor evil; it is simply a by-product and symbol of modern consumerism. Through anecdotal evidence and use of economic theory, Fishman is able to craft a work that successfully supports his thesis on the multi-faceted personality of Wal-Mart as a major
Wal-Mart is an American-based retailing company that has ventured into the international market with the aim of taking over some of the emerging markets across the globe. The company has dominated the local market in the United States, and it is looking to dominate the international market by providing consumers with some of the cheapest alternatives to the products purchased on a daily basis. It follows that Wal-Mart is among the companies that are always complaining when the economy of the United States weakens. A weaker dollar lowers the profit margins of the company because its supply chain is based overseas; hence, the purchasing power of the company decreases. This implies that when the economy is weak, Wal-Mart spends more dollars to acquire products. This paper looks into some of the fundamental principles applied by the authorities to stimulate or weaken the economy, with a close focus on the effects of these strategies on Wal-Mart.
No one can deny Wal-Mart as the corporate superpower of this generation. A company that has international interests, its power in today’s world is overwhelming. Taking a closer look into the giant’s superpowers we are able to specify exactly how Wal-Mart interfaces with the world and exerts it power therein. In doing this it must first be determined what power is. Sociologists have identified three distinct faces of power. The first is power to direct action. The second is to set agendas and decide what is to be discussed. Finally, the third power is the ability to shape desires. By examining how it is that Wal-Mart exerts power in these ways, it is possible to qualify just how
When people are placed into a group and these people have to deal with some situation, the group as a whole typically has some overriding attitude toward the situation” (). Wal-Mart focus on the individual to separate them from a group. Once they are separate the loss of their job or pay cuts take a bigger toll on the individual. Also Wal-Mart may play individuals against each other to create self doubt. In the documentary it showed how Wal-Mart would play individuals against each other by ignoring actions such as racism towards those who defied the system. By focusing on the individual, Wal-Mart is able to increase their profits through creating the inequity of power.
Wal-Mart emerged in the early 1960’s as a one-stop shop, advertising everyday low prices. The idea quickly took off and expanded beyond the original store in Arkansas to all across the U.S. by the 1980’s. People loved the convenience Wal-Mart provided, eliminating multiple trips to different stores and saving time. They also saved money by shopping here, so it was an obvious choice for many consumers to shop at and support Wal-Mart. But behind their low prices and convenience, a more sinister motive exists. The true price of big business like this is unfair wages, unethical practices, destruction of the environment and damage to local companies.