Walmart Essay

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Over the years Walmart has developed into a threatening super store jeopardizing local business success and other retail industries. Wal-Mart has not only affected, but diminished the need for small businesses making it harder for people to live and prosper. Other big name retailers like Target, K-Mart, and BJ's strive to be like Wal-Mart, but don't seem to live up to the extremely low prices Wal-Mart has. Other than the competition, independent small businesses have become bankrupt due to the up rise of Wal-Mart stores across the country. Never the less the question is still asked, why does Wal-Mart affect the local economy?
Founded less than fifty years ago by Sam Walton and his brother Bud, Wal-Mart has grown to be today’s largest profit - making enterprise in the world. Mike Duke, CEO of Wal-Mart, worked for many years on end to run the stores as efficiently as possible. Looking at Wal-Marts last fiscal year revenue, they had an excess of $300 billion dollars (Lichtenstein 3). Wal-Mart operates five thousand stores worldwide, 80 percent of these being in the United States (Lichtenstein 3). When it comes to selling merchandise, Wal-Mart has no rival. In 2003 Fortune magazine ranked Wal-Mart as the nation’s most admired company.
“The competitive success and political influence of this giant corporation enable Wal-Mart to rezone our cities, determine the real minimum wage, break trade unions, set the boundaries for popular culture, channel capital throughout the world, and conduct a kind of international diplomacy with a dozen nations.” (Lichtenstein 4) Said in “Wal-Mart The face of twenty-first-century capitalism” edited by Nelson Lichtenstein. This quote tells the reader that over-all, Wal-Mart is a dominating factor for the ...

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...at low pay with no benefits which restrict the workers from reaching full potential. Not only are the workers robbed of a fair pay, they are unable to pay for health care making it difficult to support their families. The communities that Wal-Marts inhabit are also impacted, and not always for the better. The local businesses lose customer participation, thus resulting in them going out of business. Small towns and businesses have been destroyed due to the over powering affect Wal-Mart has on a community. The company is at fault, and is not the amazing franchise people put it out to be. Wal-Mart stores have been over rated and do not take responsibility for the poor decisions they make when it comes to the business world and the way they treat their employees. People may see the good effects, but with good comes bad, and Wal-Mart certainly is not a perfect company.

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