NEWS: Is There Anyone Wal-Mart Won't Exploit?

yeah, i've only seen one 17 year old actually out in the fleet. the poor bastard couldn't wait until his 18th birthday so he could drink legally (we were stationed in sasebo japan at the time).

Walmart is only for trailer trash, isn't it?

Calling them 'wierd' is prolly not the best way to make friends. It could be for some though. Thanks for your point of view. I thought Wal-Mart was wholly incapable of such actions.

Walmart fucking rocks and you know it. If I ran a company, I would run it just like walmart. I'd fuck everyone over and laugh into their faces with my giant army of loyal and superhuman lawyers. I am above the law! As for the megacity 1 idea, sign me up. I'm all aboard for that endeavor. Can you imagine how cheap rent would be? It'd be awesome. You know what? Walmart should seceed from the nation and start its own country. It'd grow huge and powerful and destroy all of the whining pussies that dont like low prices and cheap rent. Its the walmartian way. I for one welcome our Walmart overlords.

...man, I cant wait to invade the Rhineland.

If I was under 18 and working at Wal-Mart, I would be so stoked to use a chainsaw. I'd probably put a new picture of stuff that I cut in half on my LiveJournal everyday.

Whoever posted this missed the really interesting part of this story. While WalMart was fined for violating child labor laws, the "settlement" with the government included a clause that said that the labor department would, in the future, give WalMart 15 days notice before any scheduled inspections. This is not something they do for anyone else and makes little sense if the point having such a department is to actually enforce regulations. I'm not rabidly anti-corporate (like most people under the age of 25 seem to be these days) but that struck me as pretty significant.

Wal-Mart closed in Jonquiere, Quebec the first unionized Wal-Mart store in North America, 3 months after the creation of the union.

You don't want to close a unionized store in Quebec. Maybe in the US you can do it, but unions are much more respected here than in the US, altough a lot of people are very egocentric and "my wallet is more important than yours"-style... The gap between neoliberalists and socialists is getting bigger every day.

Ever since, there has been five bomb threats against Wal-Mart in Quebec. But they turned out to be false (duh). Things are getting uglier every day it seems...people are very divided on the subject.


[Edited on Feb 15, 2005 by JunkiePuppy]

no you dont.

edit: i wish i had read all the posts first.... way to be repetitious :doh:

[Edited on Feb 15, 2005 8:00AM]

Here's a more detailed account of what really happened -- Labor Blog

26,755 recruits disagree

Still, you make a good point. I thought they were still being sent overseas and they have to be 18 before they can actually do anything, so .

Good catch Plebe, glad I read the whole thread because I was going to post this. You know shit is messed up when one company gets special treatment from the dept. of labor. It's like the cops calling a house full of partying highschoolers and telling them, "We're gonna bust you in 2 hours." Frankly, it's sickening.

how do you feel about working there? i'm honestly curious. we hear bad shit about the way they treat their employees, but how do you feel about the way they treat you?

Actually no, I didn't. I didn't write it as the primary aspect of the news story, because the article was not primarily about that. But I did mention it.

Well, Wal-Mart's run by a family. The Waltons. (5 kids, each have like $25b in stock. insane)

[Edited on Feb 15, 2005 by stockula]

thank you. i actually figured it was something along those lines. as a (hopefully soon to be reformed) corporate retail whore, i've had similar experiences. the major issues seem to arise from middle management, and the anal retentive attention to things that most executives don't have a clue about, i.e., running a retail business.

go back and read my previous post and note the my loctaion at the time of the story.

Actually, when I was a manager at UPS, we were always given up to a month's notice whenever OSHA or the Department of Labor was going to stop by for a visit.
It gave us time to prepare.

Wren,
I know somoene personally, who was discriminated against because of her gender, and where she started her career. A professional. the regional manager had a thing about women in managerial positions, and persons in managerial positions who didn't start with the company. This person ceased to be a department manager in the store that was, essentially built around her, (she worked for someone who had a lease in the previous building, and WM decided to not renew, taking over that operation internally,) She was transferred to another store 40-50 miles away. Remarks were made.
She quit, and is still a professional in her field. He eventually ceased to be a regional manager, demoted to a single store.
Supposedly, this is a common occurance.

The_Plebe,
Hmmm....scheduled inspections. Can they, dare they, do unscheduled inspections?

Stokula,
Family owned, family operated. If you own the shop, you can give tasks in it to your own kids that you couldn't hire another minor to do. I'm not sure, but I suspect incorporating ruins that loophole, and it doesn't apply to WM anyway, as the minors in question aren't Waltons.

That link says that under 18's aren't posteed overseas, and anyone under 18 is supposed to be being shipped back?