WalMart To Takeover Livonia Mall Site, Plans Detroit Store?

[313WX]

So why do you continue to support a bureaucratic company that pays its employees barely enough to qualify to pay taxes?

If a person wants to make "good" moeny, they should further their education and utilize every opportunity to improve their skill set. It's not like they're entitled to be payed anymore than the federal minimum wage.

As for the big business bitching, consideirng the fact that EVERY big business in existence was once the innocent small business/little person that you guys are supposedly defending kills your argument. They just grew up, but why you guys don't see that is a mystery to me.

BTW, I'm fairly liberal myself, but I'm not one to whine about something with two-faces. Either you're for Wal-Mart [[or any business)/Capitalism or you're not for Wal-Mart [[or any business)/Capitalism. I don't believe in taking away someone's hard-earned, honest success in life because it's not fair to others. Besides, no one here has bothered to mention anything Wal-Mart has done that's illegal [[keyword is "illegal").

[professorscott]

The simplest solution in the world avails itself for those [[such as I) who don't like Wal Mart: Don't shop there [[which I don't).

Voting with your dollars is just about the best and most effective voting there is. Wal Mart is successful because most people are desperate enough that they will shop at such a store to save a few cents, ignoring the fact that companies such as Wal Mart are what make lots of people too desperate to shop elsewhere.

It is a losing battle to try to use community regulations to prohibit such stores. They have barracks full of lawyers and they can sue until you can't afford to fight anymore. Just stay out of the stores! And convince your friends to do the same. Pay an extra fifty cents for a dozen eggs, or an extra three dollars for a bath towel, and keep your soul intact.

"All that is necessary for evil to triumph is that good men do nothing."

[English]

In order to convince your friends, you could send them "The Story of Stuff" video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9GorqroigqM

Professor Scott, I think it's a vicious cycle. People are driven to shop at Wal-Mart because real wages have been stagnant for so long... and that was before the Great Recession began. Many people know that Wal-Mart's quality isn't the best, but they can't act on what they know because they are poor [[or barely hanging on to the working class). They shop at Wal-Mart, and more smaller companies are driven out of business, which leads to more Wal-Mart shoppers.

[reddog289]

I myself would rather be shopping at the Wonderland Land and Livonia Malls,Yet that part of my life is gone.If you need stuff and can't make it, Ya gotta buy it.
And when price comes into the deal, Well you go for the lowest.
30 YEARS AGO. As a little kid I went to the WalMart in Crossville Tenn, Well I had a flashback AFTER the 96 / Middlebelt store was open for a year. What a dump both were.
I admit I go to WalMart not that often, But I don't understand why anyone within the City Limits of Detroit would be against a WalMart opening.There is a lack of grocery stores in the city, or anything other than gas stations and party stores.
But the thing is that niether Wal Mart or MEIJER needs to be robbed blind.They won't wanna stay if that happens.

[Zacha341]

Great points English and Pscott... it is a vicious cycle. Like shopping at a "going-out-of-business" mega sale. You're happy to get the great deals but then there's another store going out of business in your neighborhood with a "for sale" sign. And more people out of work, that will then feel the need to go Walmart...

In order to convince your friends, you could send them "The Story of Stuff" video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9GorqroigqM

Professor Scott, I think it's a vicious cycle. People are driven to shop at Wal-Mart because real wages have been stagnant for so long... and that was before the Great Recession began. Many people know that Wal-Mart's quality isn't the best, but they can't act on what they know because they are poor [[or barely hanging on to the working class). They shop at Wal-Mart, and more smaller companies are driven out of business, which leads to more Wal-Mart shoppers.

[Novine]

"BTW, I'm fairly liberal myself, but I'm not one to whine about something with two-faces. Either you're for Wal-Mart [[or any business)/Capitalism or you're not for Wal-Mart [[or any business)/Capitalism."

Do you really believe that's how the world operates? That has to be one of the most simplistic things I've ever heard. I guess you're OK with the near meltdown of the financial world by the Wall Street geniuses because the alternative is having the economy run by the Politburo?

[rb336]

Sweden again, maybe? The same Sweden that practiced government eugenics -- sterilization and lobotomies.

you do realize that state-mandated sterilization first reared its head the US, and well over 60,000 citizens were sterilized by force in the 20th century - through the 60s? The US was also a leader in lobotomies for most of the 20th century

[Melocoton]

The simplest solution in the world avails itself for those [[such as I) who don't like Wal Mart: Don't shop there [[which I don't).

Voting with your dollars is just about the best and most effective voting there is. Wal Mart is successful because most people are desperate enough that they will shop at such a store to save a few cents, ignoring the fact that companies such as Wal Mart are what make lots of people too desperate to shop elsewhere.

It strikes me as odd that you would cite "dollar voting" here, since Wal Mart seems like a textbook example for why that's a weak strategy. Individuals choosing by themselves--or, at best, with a few friends or relatives--to stop shopping at Wal Mart means almost nothing against a juggernaut like that. And as English says, there are certain objective reasons why many people shop at Wal Mart that go beyond individual preferences and the ability of a person to "vote with their dollar"--as long as real wages suck and people are broke, they will often shop at Wal Mart, regardless of whether professorscott, Melocoton, English, and their 3 best friends decide otherwise. And Wal Mart, as the nation's largest private employer, is a major reason why wages suck and people are broke. So it seems that battling Wal Mart would require more organized action, not less.

[Jimaz]

Walmart assistant manager refuses to give up food scraps in garbage pail to help feed rescued animal

The current recession has hit the Tampa, Florida area hard. In addition to thousands of people losing their homes to foreclosure, record numbers of pets have been starved and abandoned.

Among the victims are horses, many of whom have been dropped off in state parks to fend for themselves after their owners could no longer afford to feed them, according to Animal Control and police reports....

According to Tom and Kerri, the matter of the Brooksville Walmart's corn husk scraps are of such great importance to the corporate giant chain store, the pair of management level employees threatened to arrest and press criminal charges against anyone caught removing so much as a single scrap of food from their garbage pails.

[Downtown Lady]

I just remembered a scene from Michael Moore's Capitalism, a Love Story where an 18 year employee lost his wife [[a cake decorator at a Wal-Mart bakery who died from asthma) only to find out that Walmart had a life policy on her. They made 80 grand on her. Other companies do the same. Millions of unsuspecting americans [[canadians also?) are insured in a game of probabilities that corporations play in order to rake up cash. As Moore says, the employee are worth more dead than alive to the corporations.

So what?

He should have read the contract and knew what he was getting himself into before signing it. It's not like Wal-Mart held a gun to his head and forced him against his will to sign it. If they refused to hire him because he didn't sign it, they can legally do that.

Regarding the "dead peasant" policies whereby Wal-Mart collects life insurance money on employees that die, if I remember correctly from Michael Moore's film, Wal-Mart employees are not given a choice to consent to such a thing or not; as a matter of fact, I don't believe that it was common knowledge among employees that such a practice existed. I don't believe that any employee signs a contract giving Wal-Mart the right to collect life insurance money on them.

[Jman]

Regarding the "dead peasant" policies whereby Wal-Mart collects life insurance money on employees that die, if I remember correctly from Michael Moore's film, Wal-Mart employees are not given a choice to consent to such a thing or not; as a matter of fact, I don't believe that it was common knowledge among employees that such a practice existed. I don't believe that any employee signs a contract giving Wal-Mart the right to collect life insurance money on them.

Hundreds of companies -- including Dow Chemical, Procter & Gamble, Wal-Mart, Walt Disney and Winn-Dixie -- have purchased this insurance on more than 6 million rank-and-file workers according to Money Central, MSN. They also state that over 20% of all policies sold every year are of this type.

http://moneycentral.msn.com/content/...nce/p64954.asp

As you can see it's not just that devil Wal-Mart, it's business as usual.

[313WX]

Regarding the "dead peasant" policies whereby Wal-Mart collects life insurance money on employees that die, if I remember correctly from Michael Moore's film, Wal-Mart employees are not given a choice to consent to such a thing or not; as a matter of fact, I don't believe that it was common knowledge among employees that such a practice existed. I don't believe that any employee signs a contract giving Wal-Mart the right to collect life insurance money on them.

The point is said employee had to provide some type of authorization for Wal-Mart [[or any company) to legally place a life insurance policy on them.

In most states, NO company is forced to explain this complication to the employee. Well technically, it does mention it [[to one extent or another) in the papers they're signing if they took the time to read them.

[313WX]

Walmart assistant manager refuses to give up food scraps in garbage pail to help feed rescued animal

Ok, now you're just grasping at straws...

[Lnfant]

This book was an effective wakeup call for me in understanding how the constant pressure of imposed opinions [[whether economic or otherwise) convince us, as a society, into believing anything even if it works against the betterment of the culture at large. Greedy corps won't change until they're in that difficult place where they HAVE to change. Automobile companies are a good example of this.

Cheap: The High Cost of Discount Culture
by Ellen Ruppel Shell

from the summary:
…Low price is so alluring that we have forgotten how thoroughly we once distrusted it. Ruppel Shell traces the birth of the bargain as we know it from the industrial revolution to the assembly line to discount retailers and beyond. Cheap spotlights colorful characters from F.W. Woolworth to Gene Ferkauf, whose E.J. Korvette discount chain helped wean customers away from traditional notions of value. The rise of the chain store in postwar America led us to favor convenience over quality, and big-box retailers completed our reeducation by making us prize low price in the way we once prized durability and craftsmanship.

The effects of this insidious perceptual shift are vast: a blighted landscape, escalating debt [[both personal and national), stagnating incomes, fraying communities, and a host of other socioeconomic ills, which include the current global economic meltdown. That's a long list of charges, and it runs counter to orthodox economics, which argue that low price powers productivity by stimulating a brisk free market. Ruppel Shell marshals evidence from a wide range of fields—history, sociology, marketing, psychology, even economics itself—to upend the conventional wisdom. Cheap also unveils the fascsinating and unsettling illogic that underpins our bargain-hunting reflex, and explains how our deep-rooted need for bargains colors every aspect of our psyches and social lives.

In this myth-shattering, closely reasoned, and exhaustively reported investigation, Ruppel Shell exposes the astronomically High cost of cheap.

Ellen Ruppel Shell is a correspondent for The Atlantic magazine and has written for The New York TImes Magazine, The Washington Post, National Geographic, Time, Discover, Seed, and other publications. She is the author, most recently, of The Hungry Gene, a groundbreaking exposé of the obesity pandemic, published in six languages. She is a professor of journalism at Boston University, where she codirects the graduate program in science journalism.

[English]

^ Thanks for the recommendation! *Cheap* sounds very interesting...

[detroitbob]

The WalMart Super Center in Dearborn draws a multi-ethnic crowd, stocks products that service those communities, is opens at 7am, closes at 11pm and is the largest volume store in the region...so if it were open 24 hours it could very well be one of the top stores in the chain. If they were to open in the city proper, I predict same results. Ditto for the Meijer at 8 Mile and Woodward...if it ever gets built.

[Downtown Lady]

The point is said employee had to provide some type of authorization for Wal-Mart [[or any company) to legally place a life insurance policy on them.

I understand what you're saying but I still contend that employees do not necessarily have to provide such authorization. I may be wrong, but I have not seen anything that states that such authorization is absolutely required.

This is from the link that Jman posted:

"Right now, your company could have a life insurance policy on you that you know nothing about...

In a lot of circumstances, the families don't get anything, said attorney Mike Myers of Houston's McClanahan & Clearman, which represents survivors suing companies over corporate-owned policies. The company tries its hardest to keep the policy a secret...

Survivors lawsuits, meanwhile, typically focus on two issues:

• Whether the companies had an insurable interest in their employees' lives.

• Whether the companies were required to get the employee's permission for the policies...

Most states also have advise and consent laws that technically require companies to get workers' permission before buying life insurance on them. But attorney Myers said many businesses circumvent these laws by purchasing the insurance in one of the states that doesn't require notice or consent, including Delaware, Georgia, New Jersey, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Vermont...

Anger about these practices likely will keep the heat on Congress to make some reforms...At the very least, companies probably will have to get workers' consent before buying any new policies..."

[softailrider]

I don't know if you consider Houghton Lake to be rural, but I do. I was in the Wal-Mart there a couple of times for some emergency supplies & because up there, they were the only game in town. That store was just as dumpy as the ones in Taylor, Dearborn, & Livonia.

There's a Wal-Mart supercenter in Rochester Hills - clean, neat and well stocked. The smaller store in Troy is also just as clean. Nothing dumpy about either of them.

[sirrealone]

Nothing dumpy about either of them.

....except for some of the customers.

[313WX]

I understand what you're saying but I still contend that employees do not necessarily have to provide such authorization. I may be wrong, but I have not seen anything that states that such authorization is absolutely required.

I completely agree.

I also said in a ealier post no one forces the employees to sign it. On the other hand, the employees are also at-will, and if said business doesn't like the fact that said employees wants to sign off on the insurance policy they have every right to fire them or not hire them at all. So I don't see why Wal-Mart [[or any business) is getting so much heat about it. It's just business as usual in America.

And I'm speaking from a legal standpoint. After all, law trumps all...

[Downtown Lady]

Sorry 313WX -- maybe I am not clearly communicating what I'm trying to say.

My point is not that employees have a right to withhold such authorization [[although they do) -- my point is that employers can go ahead and get the insurance without the employee's knowledge or consent. It's not that employees are forced to provide authorization, it's that they many times don't even know that such a practice is occurring.

I understand that it may be business as usual and completely legal, but there are just some business practices that are less palatable than others.