What Was The Impact Of Walmart

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?

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

Wal-Mart is an American multinational retail corporation and one of the leading discount department retail stores (Wikipedia). It is the highest- grossing company in the United States (Fortune 2008a), and is by far one of the most successful companies worldwide. Wal-Mart offers a place to buy the majority of our goods under one roof like electronics, furniture, clothing, pharmacy, sports, food, books etc. Wal-Mart sells good at lower price than the others and this is even shown by its slogan “save money, live better”.  It drives out smaller and sometimes even the expensive stores out of business due to its lower prices. Wal-Mart provides jobs for thousands of

“Up Against Wal-Mart” by Karen Olsson, a senior editor at Texas Monthly and who’s article appeared in Mother Jones, introduces her article through the perspective of a Wal-Mart worker. She focuses on the negatives of Wal-Mart by telling the real life struggles of different Wal-Mart employees. “Progressive Wal-Mart. Really.” by Sebastian Mallaby, a columnist for the Washington Post, focuses his article on what Wal-Mart critics say and attempts to defend Wal-Mart by comparing Wal-Mart to other retailers. Even though Karen Olsson and Sebastian Mallaby both examine the negative effects of Wal-Mart, Olsson berates Wal-Mart’s unfair treatment towards employees and the unlivable wages that the world’s largest retailer provides while Mallaby

Wal-Mart, the multi-billion company and the second largest employer in the world, is the most controversial corporation in the world. Wal-Mart is a global powerhouse and affects many people around the world. Wal-Mart is constantly getting attacked from unions, human rights groups, small towns and small businesses. Wal-Mart is accused of treating their workers poorly and driving small businesses out of business. But however these accusations are false or over exaggerated. Wal-Mart offers families and low income people quality products. Also, they pay their workers competitive wages and treat them with respect. Wal-Mart opens their stores in rural and under developed areas. Wal-Mart improves the lives of the people who live rural area and

Wal-Mart is one of the top 10 largest corporations. Wal-Mart must predict what is needed and wanted in communities. Executives have to be able to see the needs like in Brazil. Wal-Mart has gone in and created social retailing school and provide skills and services in

Frederick W. Taylor worked across the United States in the first 15 years of the 20th century looking to solve production problems (Owens & Valesky, 2011, p. 67). He was an engineer in steel manufacturing and studied developed what what is now known as the four principles of scientific management. These principles spell out what both managers and workers are to do. Two important principles include having the management set goals, plan, and supervise workers, and the workers perform the work, and that organizations should establish the standard where management “sets the objectives and the workers cooperate in achieving them” (p. 67). Taylor’s principles are still used today by some organizational leaders who fight the movement that management should work as a team with the workers (pp. 67-68). Taylor’s principles have led to things such as strict discipline, the idea that workers must focus on their task with little or no interaction with colleagues, and the idea of incentive

The location of the first Wal-Mart in the Fortune Global 500 for the year of 2001 to 2002 turnover of 219.81 billion dollars. Wal-Mart is the largest company in the retail in the world. The company was much larger than its competitors in the United States - Sears Roebuck, Kmart, JC Penney and Nordstrom combined. In 2002, Wal-Mart operates more than 3,500 discount stores, Supercenters and Sam's Clubs in United States and over 1,170 stores in major countries around the world. The company also sells products online via the website, www.walmart.com. Wal-Mart is one of the largest private employers in the world, with the use of force about 1.28 million. The

He believed that these employees were easily replaceable for less pay. These kinds of procedures and ideas created an environment that was ripe for alienation. In an attempt to satisfy workers, “In return for a workers lost dignity, freedom, power and skill, Taylor promised higher pay” (Hoopes 48). Taylor also created the “differential piece rate” (Hoopes 38) which would further alienate workers from each other, claiming it improved production. Overall, Taylor’s theory of scientific management created a good environment for business owners but it only fueled alienation between the workers and the workers and society.

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. helps individuals around the globe spare cash and live better - at whatever time and anyplace - in retail locations, online and through their cell phones. Every week, more than 245 million clients and individuals visit our almost 11,000 stores under 65 flags in 28 nations and e-trade sites in 11 nations. With financial year 2015 net offers of $482.2 billion, Wal-Mart utilizes 2.2 million partners around the world. (Wal-Mart Corporate) Wal-Mart is a superpower in the business world and has been that way for 50+ years. Understanding how it got to this point and how it has maintained its successful business model starts with its

Wal-Mart has a very clear objective of promising, “everyday low prices” to their costumers. This is their way of using convenience for an advantage as a wide-ranging merchandiser. Wal-Mart ruthlessly searches for the most cost-efficient ways of grasping suppliers, distributing very low wages, and offering minimum health care. Charles Fishman wrote a book called The Wal-Mart effect – How the world’s most powerful company really works – and how it’s transforming the American economy where he took a deeper look at Wal-Mart, and carefully researched for the facts. On the other hand, Author Barry Estabrook dug into the world of the tomato industry; his goal was to discover the truths regarding the processes of how tomatoes are grown, especially when the risks and consequences faced by field laborers are taken into consideration. Estabrook wrote the book Tomatoland: How

There has been a 12% decrease in tax revenue in cities that don’t have Wal-Marts (Wal-Mart). Cities are generating relatively low tax revenues and are allowing the development of large companies in hopes of improving their local economy. Competition between smaller stores has driven the prices of goods to rise. The arrival of large companies assures lower priced goods and a stimulus in local economies. As a result of the arrival of large companies, small companies are failing. However, in their failings, new businesses have arisen and are diversifying communities with new businesses. Many people believe large companies have a harmful impact on local economies because larger companies drive smaller inefficient businesses to go out of business.

The new lackadaisical lending requirements and low interest rates drove housing prices higher, which only made the mortgage backed securities and CDOs seem like an even better investment. Now consider the housing market which had become a housing bubble, which had now burst, and now people could not pay for their incredibly expensive houses or keep up with their ballooning mortgage payments. Borrowers started defaulting, which put more houses back on the market for sale. But there were not any buyers. Supply was up, demand was down, and home prices started collapsing. As prices fell, some borrowers suddenly had a mortgage for way more than their home was currently worth and some stopped paying. That led to more defaults, pushing prices down further. As this was happening, the big financial institutions stopped buying sub-prime mortgages and sub-prime lenders were getting stuck with bad loans. By 2007, some big lenders had declared bankruptcy. The problems spread to the big investors, who had poured money into the mortgage backed securities and CDOs. They started losing money on their investments. All these of these financial instruments resulted in an incredibly complicated web of assets, liabilities, and risks. So that when things went bad, they went bad for the entire financial system. Some major financial players declared bankruptcy and others were forced into mergers, or needed

The housing market crash, which broke out in the United States in 2007, was caused by high risk subprime mortgages. The subprime mortgage crisis resulted in a sudden reduction in money and credit availability from banks and other lending institutions, which was referred to as a “credit crunch.” The “credit crunch” and its effect spread across the United States and further on to other countries across the world. The “credit crunch” caused a collapse in the housing markets, stock markets and major financial institutions across the globe.

Wal-Mart is certainly credited with changing the retail world as we know it with its low prices and big stores with huge selections but it has come at a price. They have struggled with issues that question the ethics as a company and legal issues that question how they manage people. These issues will continue to hurt their organization unless a complete change in management thinking and actions are changed. As a socially responsible organization, their management planning in this area is second to none. Lets hope they take the same effort in improving their image when it comes to ethics and legal issues.