Five Reasons to Avoid Walmart this Holiday Season.

This article has been popular. Lots of comments. So, for those saying, “People.” People can be so good and kind and community is wonderful. But read the reasons in the article…Walmart is not your friend, and we should view Walmart as a threat, not an ally to be trusted.

For those saying, “I don’t have other options.” I lived in the middle of nowhere in Vermont. Small businesses thrived. Then, Walmart came to town. Guess what happened to the small businesses, the jobs, the healthcare, the community, to Main Street?

Update: “Man kicked out of Walmart for filming this.”

 

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This year on Black Friday, American shoppers spent more than $11 billion dollars at big box retailers.

One of the largest beneficiaries of this rampant consumerism was Walmart.

And not only did families spend huge percentages of their annual budget at Walmart, they also took the opportunity to exemplify the holiday spirit by trampling each other, snatching low price, low quality items out of each others shopping carts, and blasting each other in the face with pepper spray.

The 1% hails holiday shopping as a boon for the economy, but when it takes place at multi-national corporate storefronts, it’s really nothing more than a psychological trick to pad their pocketbooks.

With our country divided and an economy that’s barely hanging on by a thread, it’s time to think about what else we’re giving away by shopping at social and financial gluttons like Walmart.

Read the rest at Brave New Films (it’s worth it): 

1. Walmart doesn’t support American business.

While the company proudly boasts and encourages shoppers to “Buy American”, the majority of the company’s goods are made outside of the United States and often made in sweatshops. When you buy something at Walmart, you are NOT buying American.

2. Walmart creates more poverty than jobs.

When a Walmart store comes to town – it isn’t the economic golden child the company’s PR machine would like you to believe. In fact, a study done by the Northwest Community group estimates that a Walmart opening up in a local town will actually decrease the community’s economic output over 20 years by an estimated $13 million. It also estimates that Walmart will cost the community an additional $14 million in lost wages for the next 20 years. This translates to communities being worse off in the long run when Walmart strolls into town. When you shop at Walmart, you are not creating jobs.

3. Walmart’s jobs are poverty jobs.

This year numerous studies released expose Walmart’s poverty wages and the corporation’s willingness to place that burden on taxpayers – not the company. A report by Wisconsin’s democrats looked at how to quantify Walmart’s cost to taxpayers in that state. At a minimum, Walmart workers in the state rely on at least $9.5 million a year to subsidize medicaid for workers. If these poverty level wages were raised to $10.10 an hour it would create 100,000 new jobs in the overall Wisconsin economy, not to mention adding another $13.5 billion to the overall economy. When you shop at Walmart you support poverty wages.

4. Walmart fires workers illegally.

Walmart has a long history of violating workers rights far beyond mistreatment. The National Labor Relations Board found that Walmart has violated the rights of workers by “unlawfully threatened, disciplined, and/or terminated employees” for “having engaged in legally protected strikes and protests” and “in anticipation or response to employees’ other protected concerted activities.” In essence – Walmart not only encourages its managers to bully employees who want to speak out about unfair practices, they will also fire you if they find out you’re planning a strike. When shopping at Walmart you support their anti-worker practices.

5. Walmart is a JOB KILLER. We’ve touched on how Walmart promotes itself as a company that values made-in-America products while their products on its shelves are largely overseas and in sweatshops. We’ve highlighted how Walmart relies on subsidies by the federal government to legally pay their workers poverty wages. We’ve even exposed Walmart for illegally firing its workers who plan to strike or threatening their jobs to keep the workers from speaking out. All of this adds up to Walmart costing us an estimated 196,000 jobs – many of them manufacturing jobs between 2001 and 2006. To prove the power Walmart has in the job market – each store opened destroys almost three local jobs for every two it creates. When you choose to shop at Walmart you don’t create jobs.

Read the rest at Brave New Films (it’s worth it).

Check out Frugal Dad’s infographic demonstrating the crushing Weight of Walmart (even years ago), and if you find the statistics as shocking as we do, please share it with everyone you know.

This article originally published on Care2.com

Image Credit: Flickr – Walmart Stores