12-29-05, 12:00 pm

Staying union free is a full-time commitment… no one in management is immune from carrying his or her “own weight” in the union prevention effort. --– Labor Relations and You at the Wal-Mart Distribution Center #6022, prepared by Orson Mason, September 1991

During the five years that she worked at a Wal-Mart store in Pennsylvania, Brenda Houle was a model employee. She consistently received stellar evaluations and won awards for her performance. She even had aspirations of becoming a store manager and sought entry into the assistant manager training program.

Unfortunately this wasn’t enough for the manager of the Hazleton Store, #2255. According to this manager all Houle needed was “willingness.” He was looking for a sexual favor (there had been a history of sexual problems with this manager). Houle wanted to move up in the company based on her experience and merit. When she began working at Wal-Mart she made $5.75 per hour. Five years later, after having worked as a customer service manager, a department manager, and the head of seasonal, she made $8.32. Men, who held the same job as Houle, were paid more although they had less experience.

Unfortunately, Houle’s story is not a unique one amongst employees of Wal-Mart. At a National Worker’s Rights Board hearing at the Jobs with Justice annual meeting in St. Louis, in September 2005, Houle and other former Wal-Mart employees delivered the sad, but true tales of their experiences working for the nation’s number one retailer, Wal-Mart.

Boasting over 1.3 million employees with over 5,000 stores and wholesale clubs across 10 countries Wal-Mart is the largest retailer in the US. Despite this success, during its 46-year existence Wal-Mart has been plagued with inherent problems that trouble many Americans. For the last two decades the United Food and Commercial Workers Union has attempted to unionize Wal-Mart employees. The average Wal-Mart associate earns just $9.68 an hour while Wal-Mart CEO Lee Scott took home $17.5 million in 2004, which equals $8,434 an hour. In 2000 after 10 butchers at a Wal-Mart store in Jacksonville, Texas successfully voted to unionize, Wal-Mart announced that it would be eliminating butchers at 180 stores in the region and eventually at all Wal-Mart super-centers nationwide. And after a Wal-Mart store in Quebec voted to unionize in 2004, Wal-Mart decided to close the store leaving hundreds of workers unemployed, claiming that the store was unprofitable.

Wal-Mart also has a long record of exploiting workers in sweatshops. In 1992 Dateline broke a story about 11-year-old workers from Bangladesh who were making T-shirts for the company. Also, in 2000, the National Labor Committee reported that workers at a handbag factory in China were forced to work 14-hour shifts, seven days a week for little or no money. Though Wal-Mart has promised to reform its international work conditions it has failed to do so as of yet.

Wal-Mart also shortchanges its employees when it comes to providing health care insurance. According to Wal-Mart CEO Lee Scott, “There are government assistance programs out there that are so lucrative it’s hard to be competitive, and it’s expensive to be competitive,” St. Louis Post Dispatch, 04/06/05.
Nationally, only 47 percent of Wal-Mart employees are covered by the company health plan, while 68 percent of employees at other large national firms receive employer-provided health care. In addition, Wal-Mart Watch reports that in 16 states Wal-Mart employees top Medicaid and CHIP rolls and many rely on public assistance for their health coverage. In addition, Wal-Mart has been targeted for its violation of environmental laws, being forced to pay over $4.5 million in penalties during the last two years alone.

History of Wal-Mart

Wal-Mart traces its beginning to 1962 when Wal-Mart founder Samuel Walton and his wife Helen put up 95 percent of the money for the first Wal-Mart store in Rogers, Arkansas. During the 1960’s Sam Walton opened 15 Wal-Mart stores, mostly in Kansas and Arkansas. In 1970, Wal-Mart stock was offered for the first time in the New York Stock Exchange. Profits from the sale of stock enabled Wal-Mart to open 276 stores in 11 states by the end of the decade. However, it was the 1980’s that propelled Wal-Mart to its current status as a corporate powerhouse. In 1983 Wal-Mart branched out into wholesale outlets, opening the first Sam’s club and in 1988 Wal-Mart opened the first SuperCenter which featured a complete grocery department along with 36 departments with general merchandise. By 1989 Wal-Mart’s profits topped $26 billion.

In 2004 the retail giant generated over $256 billion in global revenue, and added more than $26 billion in sales. It also earned nearly $9.1 billion in net income and grew earnings per share by over 15 percent.

This financial capital has allowed Wal-Mart executives to promote their own political ideologies and objectives, both within Wal-Mart stores and in local communities. In many Wal-Mart stores, the pharmaceutical departments do not sell birth-control or emergency contraception, a problem which has angered many women’s groups. In 1995 Wal-Mart also pulled a T-shirt from its shelves which read “Someday a Woman Will Be President,” citing the shirt could offend some people. In 1996, the retailer refused to sell Sheryl Crow’s self-titled album, because of lyrics which questioned the sale of guns. Recently Wal-Mart has banned Maxim, FHM, and Stuff magazines from store shelves.

Survival of the Fittest

In the game of capitalism, where Charles Darwin’s infamous notion of “survival of the fittest” determines the winners and losers, it is apparent that Wal-Mart is definitely a winner – and it has done so at a cost to the public. On the local and national levels, Wal-Mart is a recipient of large subsidies and other perks which have enabled it to expand at such a quick rate. This expansion has often hurt local businesses, which simply can’t compete with the expansive resources of Wal-Mart.

According to Bill Fletcher, a National Worker’s Rights Board member and president of TransAfrica Forum, Wal-Mart is for our generation what the Ford Motor Company was for an earlier generation. Ford intimidated workers with surveillance, firings and worse. At the same time it sought to buy off opponents through community contributions and donations as well as cultivating a cadre of ministers who were willing to praise Ford and condemn unions. It was through a partnership between the NAACP, the National Negro Congress, and the United Auto Workers that Ford was finally organized and held accountable to the people of the United States; an important lesson in how we should take Wal-Mart to task.

Frustrated by all of the injustices of Wal-Mart community groups, labor unions and others are beginning to take a stand. A broad coalition of organizations including, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), Jobs with Justice, Acorn, the Sierra Club, the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW), and Wal-Mart Watch, have begun to organize one of the largest corporate campaigns in history against Wal-Mart. In November these organizations, led by Wal-Mart Watch hosted “Higher Expectations Week” a week of action against Wal-Mart where they will demand that Wal-Mart changes its practices. Also in November, Brave New Films released a made-for-DVD documentary produced by Robert Greenwald, entitled, Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price. UFCW, Jobs with Justice and Acorn will continue to organize actions and events into the holiday season.

Though all of these organizations may have different demands of Wal-Mart (and different tactics for getting these demands met) each of them are clear on one thing: the goal is not to shut Wal-Mart down, but rather to get it to change its practices.