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Monday, April 25, 2011

Should Walmart Pay Its Workers $12 An Hour?

Retail giant could easily pay its employees more, UC Berkeley report says

Walmart is plowing through its global responsibility goals, cutting down on plastic waste, improving energy efficiency in factories, and reshaping the crop diversity of entire U.S. regions. But it's doing a less-than-stellar job when it comes to doing right by its workers. According to a new report (.pdf file) from the University of California, Berkeley, Walmart could significantly raise the wages of its employees without affecting its low prices. Chronically underpaid people around the country could benefit.

When Walmart inevitably moves into cities like New York City, Boston, Los Angeles, and San Francisco (all places where it wants to expand this year), its cheapskate policies could actually lower the local average wages. And since the costs of living a comfortable life march inexorably upward (especially in big cities), this is a problem for all of us.

18 comments:

Anonymous said...

You pay the people what they're worth, not what you can afford.

Anonymous said...

If you don't like the wage find another job. If you can't do better go back to school.

Anonymous said...

nope. their over paid now.

Anonymous said...

$12.oo an hour is fair for retail but who can live on $25,000.00 a year? It is still poverty wages.

Anonymous said...

supply and demand

Anonymous said...

as long as someone is willing to work for that wage why raise it?

maybe if the people there showed some initiative they would get raises

Anonymous said...

And the oil companies could lower the prices we ALL pay for gasoline, but they won't. Why should Walmart change?

Fruitland Generic Citizen said...

11:11 - "maybe if the people there showed some initiative they would get raises"

You sound like a factory manager from 1830 - "What, working 16 hours a day 6 days a week too good for 'em?"

Corporations don't work that way. They uses workers to generate the maximum profit, and discard them when their usefulness has been expended. Raises only occur when factory owners must increase them to meet their labor needs. Not a minute before. Corporations would keep workers working for starvation wages if they could. Even Henry Ford, racist and anti-Semite that he was, knew enough to pay his workers enough that they could buy his cars. Corporations today care about one things - today's stock price.

Anonymous said...

12:04 then if they don't like it get another job. This is 2011 and the government dictates minimum wage unlike "back in the day". Wake up. These people have it made compared to a factory worker. Besides most of them are part-time. Give it to a liberal to carry this thing to a non-existent extreme.

Anonymous said...

12:04: let me guess your a union lackey.

the workers are walmart are the most lackadaisical workers ive seen. they cant work ot, and for the most part wont.

raises should be on a performance basis, nothing else

Anonymous said...

11:33

I guess you must be clueless about a world market for oil and the prices.
Oil companies make about 7 cents on the dollar. Guess they couldn't lower the prices very much now could they?
Oh, by the way. Read the post about shell spending billions of dollars trying to establish a domestic source for oil only to be thwarted by the Obama administration.

Face the facts, Gasoline is expensive in this county because of Democrats and leftest environazis

Anonymous said...

Walmart , the most complaining workers I've ever seen. Every time
I'm in the store there is always a group of 2 or more moaning and groaning about something.

Anonymous said...

Well, Joe, here I was going to bust you for having such a slow news day that you'd print such drivel, coming out of Berkley, at that. What other conclusion could we expect from such a leftist institution? But, God Bless America, most of your posters ahead of me let the light of truth shine ahead. Supply and demand. Want a better job, improve your skills. Oh, the big bad corporation could settle for making a little less profit. Costs go up, prices go up, so then who pays, the consumer. I heard from a local person who recently was in the public eye, that Walmart is a pretty good place to work, with opportunity for advancment for people with initiative and who work hard. It doesn't get any better than that.

Anonymous said...

Most of the people working there should be paying WalMart to work for them. We went in the North Salisbury store the other night and the Greeter was sitting in in a chair (all fat and sloppy) not a good image to portray at all

Anonymous said...

I thought Lenin died a long time ago! What liberal cell did 12:04 crawl out of ? The other day I was in Walmart and it took 4 employees about 20 minutes to find someone with a key to unlock a cabinet containing something I wanted to buy. If these people worked for me 3 of the 4 would have been fired. Only one even acted like he cared if they sold me anything. Two were text messaging somebody and the other was wondering around like he was lost.

Anonymous said...

There are plenty of jobs you can get without going back to school, Im talking jobs that pay more than min wage and more than $12/hr. Folks are not ambitious as they once were.

Anonymous said...

anyone who shops wakmart is anti americam anyway, all there gods are foreign

Anonymous said...

They knew the rate of pay and the benefits when they were hired