Tag Archives: Wal-Mart

Why Capitalism Is Good

Wal MartSo much is said regarding ‘greed’ and ‘corporations’.  Let’s not forget that until the advent of free trade and individual property rights – the common peasant was destined to farm the same land with the same tools as their ancestors.

The benefits of free trade:

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — Wal-Mart Stores Inc. pushed down prices for some generic prescription drugs to just $4 eight years ago, setting a new industry standard. Now it is trying to do the same for seeing a doctor.

On Friday, a Walmart Care Clinic opened in Dalton, Ga., six months after Walmart U.S., the retailer’s WMT, +0.27%   biggest unit, entered the business of providing primary health care. It now operates a dozen clinics in rural Texas, South Carolina and Georgia and has increased its target for openings this year to 17.

An office visit costs $40, which Walmart U.S. says is about half the industry standard, and just $4 for Walmart U.S. employees and family members with the company’s insurance. A pregnancy test costs just $3, and a cholesterol test $8. A typical retail clinic offers acute care only. But a Walmart Care Clinic also treats chronic conditions such as diabetes. (Walmart U.S. also leases space in its stores to 94 clinics owned by others that set their own pricing.)

“It was very important to us that we establish a retail price in the health-care industry because price leadership matters to us,” said Jennifer LaPerre, a Walmart U.S. senior director responsible for health and wellness, in an interview.

Health Care is just another commodity that, when subjected to the free market, will bend to the advantage of the consumer.

US Federal Government and Wal-Mart

Wal MartWalmart is evil, right?  Low paying jobs that keep the masses poor.  They brow beat their suppliers into selling at such low prices that no one can make a living.

They are the worst of the worst.  Right?

Maybe not:

The federal government is better at creating low-paying jobs than Wal-Mart and McDonald’s combined, according to a new report.

A study released earlier this month from the public policy group Demos states that through various forms of government funding in the private sector, nearly two million people are making $12 an hour or less. The number of workers at Wal-Mart and McDonald’s together at $12 an hour or less is currently around 1.5 million, according to the report.

Personally, the quality of government help is such that earning more than 12 bucks is surprising, so…..I’m mostly okay with the data.

But it sure is interesting that Obama has more “slave wage” jobs than Wal-Mart and Micky Dee’s combined.

 

Laffer’s Curve

The Laffer Curve

The Laffer Curve.  It’s the idea that as tax rates rise beyond a certain point, tax revenue declines.  It makes sense at the extremes; a tax of 0% raises zero dollars.  A tax of 100% also raises zero dollars.  No one works for free.

An example of this concept was displayed in Washington DC last month:

Wal-Mart Stores (WMT) no longer plans to build three stores in the nation’s capitol, after the city’s council voted to force large retailers to pay starting wages that are 50% higher than the minimum wage there.

The world’s largest retailer also said it will consider its options related to three other Washington, D.C., stores that are still under construction.

D.C., a wildly successful example of a city that lifts its poor and most fragile citizens out of poverty:

/sarcasm

has once again created a law that really proves who is waging a “war on the poor.”

It isn’t the conservative whole embraces the free market that “hates” the poor, no.  Rather, it’s the intellectual liberal that “hates” the poor.  How else to describe the mentality of a people who vote to force job creators out of the market?

You’ll probably never get rich at Wal-Mart, but a job there is better than not a job anywhere.

Disaster Planning: Free Market vs. Government

Sadly, most conversations regarding damage, preparedness and reaction to catastrophes take place during or AFTER an event takes place.  Such is the nature of people, and is what separates us from even squirrels.  Even they gather for the winter.

However, there are people, organizations who do look ahead and plan.  They take the responsibility seriously and give great thought to the subject.  These people study disasters and recoveries.  In fact, the organizations they work in are aptly named; Disaster Recovery.  We have one for my company, in fact, we have staff at my building.

As with anything, there are certain people more skilled at this than others.  In fact, again, just like we would expect, there are groups of people, organizations, that are better at it than other groups of people.  It should not surprise anyone that when it comes to government preparedness and the private sector’s planning, who’s side I’ll take.

Consider this: Via Carpe Diem

Forecasters don’t expect Hurricane Irene to make landfall until Saturday. But for nearly a week now, big-box retailers like Walmart and Home Depot have been getting ready.

They’ve deployed hundreds of trucks carrying everything from plywood to Pop-Tarts to stores in the storm’s path. It’s all possible because these retailers have turned hurricane preparation into a science.

At Home Depot’s Hurricane Command Center in Atlanta, for example, about 100 associates have been trying to anticipate how Irene will affect its East Coast stores from the Carolinas to New York.

At times like this, the Command Center looks much like NASA Mission Control during a shuttle launch, says Russ Householder, the company’s emergency-response captain.

“We’ve got all the key news agencies on the big screens up front,” he says. “We’re also monitoring our store sales so we can better be in tune to what’s happening in our stores, and we’re also connected live one-on-one with district managers in the impacted areas.”

Walmart is able to anticipate surges in demand during emergencies by using a huge historical database of sales from each store as well as sophisticated predictive techniques, Cooper says.

He says that with Irene on the way, that system is helping them allocate things like batteries, ready-to-eat foods and cleaning supplies to areas in the storm’s path.

Walmart also has the advantage of having a staff meteorologist, Cooper says.

Walmart’s preparedness system helped the company emerge as a hero after Katrina, says Steve Horwitz, an economist at St. Lawrence University in Canton, N.Y., who studied the company’s response.

“They know exactly what people want after a hurricane,” he says. “One of my favorite stories from Katrina is that the most popular food item after a major storm like this is strawberry Pop-Tarts.”

Wanna see what Wal-Mart’s preparation for moving supplies in, before Katrina, looked like?

Care to see the Government’s preparation for moving people OUT?

As 1,000’s of people needed to leave the city, a city that sits BELOW sea level, the government left a fleet of buses to simply flood.

Government simply can not DO like the private, for profit, sector operating in a free market.