When a Bargain is a Bad Thing

Everybody likes to find a bargain. That's why some grocery stores put the amount of money you saved from their specials or club benefits on your receipt. "You saved $7.53 today, Mrs. Smith." "Oh, that's good", you say, looking at your receipt with a smile while you're walking away from the check-out area.

Is it ever not good when you save money? Isn't that why stores advertise their specials in full page ads, because they know people will be looking for the best deals? Isn't that why competition is good for the consumer?

Today, many people don't bother to look at the ads anymore. They simply follow the crowds filing into Wal-Mart. They know that most of the items they want to buy will probably cheaper at Wal-Mart than at other stores.

There's a reason Wal-Mart is cheaper and none of those reasons are good for America. They have their products made in China and other third world countries where workers do the labor for a couple of dollars a day. This sends manufacturing jobs out of the country. They are so big that they can negotiate better prices which will eventually force other stores out of business because they have to pay more for the same products. They therefore have to charge more because they don't have the same volume buying power. That loses more jobs for Americans. By causing all those jobs to be lost, there is a large employee base to hire from so they can offer lower wages, little or no insurance and benefits and won't allow unions so there is no organized, collective voice for the workers. Eventually the lower wages will become the standard for everyone. Then other big corporations will fire their higher paid employees and hire someone who will work for less because we will have created an atmosphere of desperation where there is only one job for every twenty or more people looking for work.

Wal-Mart buyers do a very good job of finding the best deals overseas. With the volume they buy to supply all their many stores, even a few pennies saved can amount to a great deal of money and fabric manufacturers and factories have no choice but to give in to the tough negotiations. An order from Wal-Mart can make their whole year, but every year, a few more pennies are whittled down from each item. The workers in those factories of course, have to make up the slack by increasing their output. Some of those workers in Asia earn 16 cents an hour and work ten hours a day, seven days a week. If their corporate greed is criticized, Wal-Mart's answer is that they're giving the people what they want. They're satisfying our greed and self interest.

Human Resource people at the mega store's home office admit that their employees can't support a family on their salary alone. In order to have even a very modest life-style, a husband and wife would both have to work. That leaves children with baby-sitters or home alone. It's even worse in the countries where Wal-Mart contracts with their suppliers. So much for family values.

We have to wake up to the fact that we are all inter-related. We can't go on thinking just about what's good for us and the heck with the other guy. Without a social conscience, we will all eventually become the “other guy” because the entire fabric of the American way of life as we've known it is disappearing and it's happening at an ever accelerating rate. The warning signs are all around us and if we don't heed them now we're going to wake up one morning in a very changed and unpleasant world. This won't be a temporary downturn in the economy. The situation we and current political policies are creating will be permanent.

Yes, it's nice to save a little in the short term, but in the long term, some sacrifice on our part by paying a few cents more will be better for America and our economy. Wal-Mart will eventually eliminate the middle class in this country at the rate things are going. We'll then have a society made up of the wealthy owners of big corporations and the worker ants. Our children will have very limited opportunities as more and more of the competition is forced out of business as the regular Wal-Marts continue to give way to the Super Wal-Marts where you not only can buy socks and underwear and an electric can opener but your groceries as well. Unemployment has nowhere to go but up. People will lose their homes and the Bushes and Cheneys and the other 1% of the "elite" will buy up properties like the United States is a big Monopoly board.

"St. Peter don't you call me 'cause I can't go, I owe my soul to the company store." (Lyrics from "Sixteen Tons")

12-8-03