Would you rather have the Wal-mart that hires the workers that other businesses cannot use and for whom politicians can offer no assistance–people with little education or training, including people with disabilities? Or would you rather have the “activists” who fight to keep out Wal-Mart or who insist that they should dictate Wal-Mart’s labor policies?

Neither. I’d rather have the government which pays for the healthcare of Wal-Mart’s disabled employees. Wal-Mart’s minimum-wage employees don’t get healthcare through the company; they get Medicaid.

I’d like to see all welfare replaced by a National Basic income, c’ Milton Friedman and Hayek.

The real deal with Wal-mart, I think, is that the division of labor is limited by the extent of the market. The extent of the market for mass manufacturing is world wide, but in the towns where Wal-Mart has such a big impact are themselves small. Of late, the sort of people who would be willing to pay a premium for boutique goods and services have been moving to the cities where there’s a bigger local market, more choices, and where Wal-Mart is not such a big deal one way or another.

In short, Camden County, NC, say, is going to be poor whether or not there’s a Wal-Mart there, but at least with one there, the people can get cheap stuff. The problem of poverty there is mostly fixed by leaving it for cities like Raleigh, which paradoxically, leaves the people who stay poorer still on average.

Ok, here goes.

Wal-Mart vs communism – easy win for Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart sells things that let people enjoy their lives, spend time with their families, entertain their children, etc. Stuff that, on some level, helps in living a good life.

Wal-Mart hasn’t been around that long though and lots of things necessary for Wal-Mart to exist aren’t so great for a society.

Wal-Mart needs a pipeline of really cheap goods. Goods so cheap that no one can make much of a living making them – unless you’re the person who owns dozens of factories churning out Wal-Mart feed by the container-load. People work at Wal-Mart and, as someone above pointed out, collect food stamps.

What does Wal-Mart sell? Nothing well made. Not a lot of artisans improving their craft selling to the Wal-Mart customer base.

Still, Wal-Mart only replaced a sick society – towns would have a store on Main Street that was badly run and overpriced because, hey, what choice do you have?

I don’t have the answers but if Wal-Marts exist then I do know that your country is in deep trouble.

And what’s up with libertarians and Walmart? Barnabas is right on the money.

If that’s the question the answer is obvious. The activists are parasites who depend on the existence of Wal-Mart anyway.

I don’t think that’s the question.

I think the question is:

Would you rather live in a society where the highest value is getting the most cheap imported plastic crap for the least money or not?

Put that way the answer is far different.