Wally's World

I half-paid-attention to an hour-and-a-half-long program called Wal-mart Nation on CNBC last night. What I caught of it was fascinating. It seemed to be a fairly balanced report, though it naturally enough had its focus skewed somewhat toward favoring Wal-mart's perspective over that of its detractors (at least from what I saw which, admittedly, was not the whole thing). I say "naturally enough" both because a harsh look at Wal-mart would almost necessarily indict the whole capitalist system, in which CNBC is bound up, but more saliently because it would probably be hard to get Wal-mart's cooperation at all if the piece looked to be more negative than positive.

Some of the interesting (though not illuminating) insights:

• People buy more Pop-Tarts (particularly strawberry-flavored) during stormy weather than at other times. Wal-Mart knows this because they track every sale, virtually in real-time. And have a computer system second in size only to the Pentagon's.
• When citizens in towns like Lancaster PA (or is it Lebanon--crap I always confuse those two) work to keep Wal-Mart out, it's just "a small group of people" who are doing this; most people there would welcome Wal-Mart with open arms. "A small group" that's been working diligently against Wal-Mart for 7 years (anyone else see parallels to Iraq here?).

Perhaps what was most telling was Wal-Mart's CEO's defense of Wal-Mart's practices in terms of outsourcing jobs oversees and pushed its suppliers to do so: he said, in essence, corporations have been doing it for years, it's not like we're doing anything new or illegal here, we're just the biggest and best, so of course we're very noticable. And he's got a point. What is Wal-Mart doing except taking the a-human forces of capitalism to the nth degree, doing everything possible to lower cost to increase profit? Wal-Mart didn't single-handedly structure the world such that there are savage inequalities; Wal-Mart didn't single-handedly make it so that there are scads of people who are willing to work for almost nothing because it seems to preferable to the alternative; Wal-Mart didn't invent monopolistic practices and they aren't the only company ever to despise the thought of their labor force unionizing; and it's not like no one else would do it if Wal-Mart wasn't. But does that make it all right?

And then there's the flip side, the consumer angle. However much one might parody Wal-Mart as "Your source for cheap plastic crap," the fact is they've been wildly successful at selling us cheap plastic crap. And really, what are our alternatives? In my hometown, for instance, mom and pop stores that would might have been driven out by Wal-Mart were driven out long before Wal-mart arrived. If I the consumer boycott Wal-Mart and buy from some alternative chain, what assurance do I have that they're any better in their practices? On the one hand, Wal-Mart has created an atmosphere of plausible deniability (labor problems: we're the largest employer in the country, of course some people are going to be unhappy; monopolistic practices: we're the advocate of the consumer, we're doing it for them; outsourcing labor: it's good for those people and America will create more and better jobs anyway) and on the other hand, when it comes to the tangibles that we can see, Wal-Mart wins, because the most salient features of Wal-Mart are that 1) the prices are lower and 2) you can buy virtually everything there. "Cheap convenience" just might be the two most magical words of the 20th and 21st centuries in America. If we have a sense of personal economy (and it's hard not to, given the pinch of the national economy currently), then we should make the buying decisions that are the cheapest (given relatively equal quality, an intangible that's usually difficult to judge). And given the structure of modern towns and cities, where driving your car is virtually a necessity, it seems far preferable to drive to as few different places as possible to meet one's needs. Gone are the days of walking down-town from this little shop to that little shop: the shops are gone and so is walking as a form of transport. So it's no surprise that Wal-Mart is wildly successful, and it doesn't look like the conditions for that success are likely to change.

Golly gosh gee this sounds pessimistic.  Blame it on the western Pennsylvania weather, where we've gotten a delicious taste of spring only to be smacked back into the dead of winter. Almost makes one want to say "Screw you mother nature! Corporate capitalism is going to rock your ass and, given your treatment of me, I won't feel too sorry for you!" Almost.

tags: "serious"  

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