A new report released by Americans for Tax Fairness reveals the true costs everyday consumers pay for Walmart’s low prices. The company, and specifically the several Walton family members who control it, receive an estimated $7.8 billion per year in tax breaks and taxpayer subsidies.
The Waltons are the wealthiest family in the United States and control a majority of shares in Walmart. Six members of the family are among the 85 wealthiest individuals in the world, a group whose wealth is greater than half of the world’s population. Walmart is also among the largest and most profitable companies on the planet, with $16 billion in profits last year alone.
Despite this extreme prosperity, the company refuses to pay decent wages to its employees, and many are forced to rely on taxpayer-funded assistance such as food stamps and Medicaid. A previous study showed that a single Walmart can cost taxpayers anywhere from $904,542 to nearly $1.75 million per year, or about $5,815 per employee for these programs.
This latest report expands on that research to include other hidden costs to taxpayers courtesy of the nation’s wealthiest family, including schemes to avoid paying an estimated $3 billion in taxes. The executive summary highlights examples totaling $7.8 billion in subsidies from American taxpayers:
“Walmart receives an estimated $6.2 billion annually in mostly federal taxpayer subsidies. The reason: Walmart pays its employees so little that many of them rely on food stamps, healthcare and other taxpayer-funded programs.
Walmart avoids an estimated $1 billion in federal taxes each year. The reason: Walmart uses tax breaks and loopholes, including a strategy known as accelerated depreciation that allows it to write off capital investments considerably faster than the assets actually wear out.
The Waltons avoid an estimated $607 million in federal taxes on their Walmart dividends. The reason: income from investments is taxed at a much lower tax rate than income from salaries and wages.”
Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of the report is how much the company costs taxpayers in public assistance for Walmart employees, broken down state by state. Texas taxpayers pay the most, at an estimated $682 million each year for the state’s 154,471 Walmart associates. Washington, D.C., having successfully prevented four of six planned stores from opening, pays the least at an appreciable $2.6 million for only 600 employees.
Estimated Annual Cost of $6.2 Billion in Public Assistance for Walmart Employees, by State
| State | Number of Walmart Employees | Estimated Cost of Public Assistance for Walmart Employees (Millions) |
| Alabama | 35,016 | $154.6 |
| Alaska | 3,454 | $15.2 |
| Arizona | 32,438 | $143.2 |
| Arkansas | 38,901 | $171.8 |
| California | 80,460 | $355.2 |
| Colorado | 26,325 | $116.2 |
| Connecticut | 9,289 | $41.0 |
| Delaware | 4,423 | $19.5 |
| Florida | 97,222 | $429.2 |
| Georgia | 53,168 | $234.7 |
| Hawaii | 4,020 | $17.7 |
| Idaho | 7,026 | $31.0 |
| Illinois | 50,341 | $222.3 |
| Indiana | 36,923 | $163.0 |
| Iowa | 16,557 | $73.1 |
| Kansas | 19,937 | $88.0 |
| Kentucky | 28,454 | $125.6 |
| Louisiana | 33,621 | $148.4 |
| Maine | 7,436 | $32.8 |
| Maryland | 18,573 | $82.0 |
| Massachusetts | 12,252 | $54.1 |
| Michigan | 31,076 | $137.2 |
| Minnesota | 20,997 | $92.7 |
| Mississippi | 22,321 | $98.5 |
| Missouri | 40,374 | $178.3 |
| Montana | 5,096 | $22.5 |
| Nebraska | 11,207 | $49.5 |
| Nevada | 14,251 | $62.9 |
| New Hampshire | 7,839 | $34.6 |
| New Jersey | 18,593 | $82.1 |
| New Mexico | 14,322 | $63.2 |
| New York | 37,034 | $163.5 |
| North Carolina | 52,459 | $231.6 |
| North Dakota | 4,396 | $19.4 |
| Ohio | 49,716 | $219.5 |
| Oklahoma | 31,692 | $139.9 |
| Oregon | 11,482 | $50.7 |
| Pennsylvania | 48,871 | $215.8 |
| Puerto Rico | 14,552 | $64.2 |
| Rhode Island | 2,493 | $11.0 |
| South Carolina | 28,662 | $126.5 |
| South Dakota | 4,808 | $21.2 |
| Tennessee | 38,470 | $169.8 |
| Texas | 154,471 | $682.0 |
| Utah | 16,422 | $72.5 |
| Vermont | 911 | $ 4.0 |
| Virginia | 41,950 | $185.2 |
| Washington | 19,350 | $85.4 |
| Washington, DC | 600 | $ 2.6 |
| West Virginia | 11,959 | $52.8 |
| Wisconsin | 28,641 | $126.5 |
| Wyoming | 4,574 | $20.2 |
OUR Walmart, the organization of current and former employees calling for higher wages and better working conditions at Walmart, has organized widespread strikes and protests to bring attention to the company’s reliance on taxpayer programs to subsidize labor costs. Indeed, many members of OUR Walmart have questioned why they must rely on food stamps when they work at the most profitable company in the country. Last year, employees at one store in Canton, Ohio, gained national attention after hosting a holiday canned food drive for each other. Walmart defended its employees for looking out for each other, but as Stephen Colbert pointed out, the company wasn’t much help in actually paying workers enough to make ends meet.
As long as profitable, industry standard–setting employers like Walmart refuse to pay a decent wage, taxpayers will continue to foot the bill. However, two recent victories demonstrate one path to change could come from within the company’s own ranks. More and more low-wage employees are turning to social media to connect with fellow workers and expose abuse at mega retailers. Two recent changes to Walmart’s pregnancy and scheduling policies illustrate that pressure from within could be having an effect. Combined with the outcry of consumers and taxpayers, Walmart may have no choice but to redirect their profits from stock buybacks to the people that stock shelves.
Walmart is COSTING us big time!!
Raise the minimum wage and cut corporate tax loop holes and this fiasco will be diminished significantly.
You are SO right, Susan! Because if they “raise minimum wage and cut corporate loop holes”, then all the companies would move their companies to other countries like India, Korea, China….and this ‘fiasco’ would be GREATLY diminished when there are no low-income, minimum wage, Wal-Mart type jobs to complain about here in the US. And I’m sure those people would be glad to get them! Oh that’s right….it’s already happening every day right now! That’s why when we call Verizon for ‘tech support’, we can’t understand a damned thing the representative is saying in their ‘foreign accents’. 🙁
“cut corporate tax loop holes” This means corporations will pay higher taxes. (Higher taxes means more dollars removed from the economy. A growing economy always needs a growing supply of dollars.) This also means that in aggregate, YOU will pay higher prices, have fewer benefits and have lower stock dividend returns. Corporations do not pay corporate taxes. Corporate taxes are actually “pass through” taxes. You pay these higher taxes yourself, as I mentioned above. Our Monetarily Sovereign federal government does not even need tax receipts to pay for spending. Federal taxes simply manage aggregate demand, they don’t “fund” anything. As far as the minimum wage-raise it, absolutely!
Hmmmm….last time I checked Walmart employs hundreds of thousands of people…essentially paying their bills and putting food on their table. And last time I checked people have a choice in whether they want to work for Walmart or not. You don’t like their wages? Find a different job. Walmart literally employs anyone and everyone and are a great stepping stone into the job force. You aren’t really required to have any special skills or formal training to work there…therefore wages aren’t very high. What do you expect? You’re not supposed to actually STAY at Walmart if you expect to make more money in life. Silly people.
This is yet another article that only tells one side of the story in an attempt to garner clicks. Income inequality and minimum wage are hotly debated topics right now and these titles spread like wildfire.
Shill.
Wow. http://www.simplypsychology.org/cognitive-dissonance.html
Read, young man. Read, consider, THEN post. The entire story is written to expose the fact that the waltons use YOUR tax money to pay for THEIR employees food through food stamps.
And you believe that the waltons work over 500 times as hard as their employees, and thus are rightfully entitled their astronomical pay?
Chill. Walmart isn’t costing me anything. The people working at Walmart, that decided a minimum wage job was going to be their career and refuse to get a better job and can’t afford to live without government assistance…they are costing taxpayers, and me. If they didn’t like the wages, they shouldn’t have applied for the job. It’s a far stretch to make the connection that Walmart is costing taxpayers money. They are paying their employees minimum wage, who therefore are FORCED to get food stamps because they can’t afford life? Really?? That’s completely ridiculous. People can’t seem to accept accountability for their actions anymore, and demand other people to pay for choices. This article is just fuel to ignorant people’s fire.
What planet are you living on? After the Rublicans tanked the economy, people took whatever jobs they could get, & when the Federal Government subsidizes a locust like Walton, it costs you, directly, as it comes from your taxes – & everyone else’s – & comes from all sorts of services & programs that need, & are more deserving of, tax dollars.
Sorry, I can’t take anyone seriously that says “after Republicans tanked the economy.” More of the same old blame game. Round and round we go….
I realize this is two years old, but 2 years ago you were so daft that come 2 years later I simply have to know if you’ve learned anything yet. Do you understand that you pay taxes and that tax money funds government aid programs? If so, then do you not see the 100% rational and logically verifiable truth that Walmart profits vast sums of money because they do not pay the full cost of doing business, as they pay employees so low that they are eligible for government assistance. Walmart stockholders and the Waltons became absurdly rich pulling off one of the biggest scams in this century, if not a better portion of recorded history.
The facts are publicly accessible and the connections painfully obvious. The best lies and scams are played right in the open, where people assume that nobody would be that stupid or that bold. They were, and they took us all for a ride, and snot nosed picks suffering from Stockholm Syndrome with an attitudes like yours defend them.
We should be burning their stores to the ground and displaying their heads on pikes proudly proclaiming, “Fool me once…shame on…me…fool me….ya fool me ya can’t get fooled again, fuck you, thieving fucks, try it again.”
Where is the passion, the hunger for liberty and justice, the righteous anger and the unity to back it up? Why do we allow this, why don’t we put the fear of the people into these bastards? This is ridiculous, it’s absurd, what in the fuck is going on with people in this world that they think think this is okay, that this is normal? It’s unreal.
The REPUBLICANS tanked the economy????? heheheheh Sure! Right!! Do YOU work at Wal-Mart or are you one of those who lost you job when “the REPUBLICANS tanked the economy?” I can assure you, there are far more people living off my taxes right now than there were 6 years ago, and it AIN’T because they are working at WAL-MART!
The federal government has over 1,600 funding programs that subsidize the American taxpayer. Directly or indirectly, these programs put money into your pocket (whether you are a federal taxpayer, or not.) Grow up, everyone is on the federal government gravy train.
Not everyone is meant to work in a professional job and enjoy the benefits of that life. Somebody’s got to serve you your damned latte and just because they don’t have a college degree (which, by the way, is a very expensive thing to get) doesn’t mean they should live in poverty. They deserve a living wage and to be granted full time hours with benefits. Who is ignorant here?
http://www.upworthy.com/the-shocking-truth-about-what-it-would-cost-us-all-if-walmart-paid-living-wage
Yes, it DOES mean exactly that , Gianine Carbone! And YES, a college degree is a VERY expensive thing to get. That’s why I worked two jobs, while taking care of an aging mother, a husband and two small children to get my degree and PAY for ever dime of it myself, so that I didn’t have to WORK at Wal-Mart or any other low wage job for the rest of my life. And as for living in poverty…..these people don’t KNOW poverty! They are working, eating, driving cars, talking on cell phone, have decent clothes… ALL the things that my family and I had BEFORE I worked my ass off to ‘rise above’ so that I cold afford to have more, and all WITHOUT food stamps and government handouts. Rest assured that Wal-Mart provides GOOD benefits as well as profit sharing (for which a LOT of people got VERY rich who became employed there when Wal-Mart was building their empire. Yes, people have to start out as ‘part timers’ until they ‘prove themselves’ to be worthy and loyal employees. So WHAT?? It’s stupidity and ignorance that makes people think that those who haven’t ‘done the time’ should live as well as those of us who have ‘paid our dues’ so that we can have more than the average Joe. My husband and I have busted our butts our entire married lives so that one day we could retire and be comfortable. We didn’t have more children than we could afford. We didn’t squander our money on cigarettes, going out to eat every meal and Dollar Store bullshit every payday. We didn’t buy Nike tennis shoes and Gucci bags, and I didn’t have my hair and nails done every week and then cry because I didn’t have money for rent. We managed and budgeted ever damn dime! No, I don’t believe in SOCIALISM. Yes, people at Wal-Mart work as hard as I do, but they aren’t as PROUD as I am, or they wouldn’t still be, as you claim, living in poverty! They’d have aspired to do greater things instead of whining about all the ‘rich people’ that have MORE than they have!
Well Adam. I see there is at lest ONE intelligent person on this forum! Well said!!
WhoAmIBeing…..YES, The Waltons built that company. They sure as HELL deserve to make more money than they employees! DUH! If these people weren’t working for Wal-Mart, they probably wouldn’t be employed at ALL! And THEN how much government handouts do you think they’d be drawing every year? Are people REALLY this stupid, or do you just hate people who have MORE than you do?
Bless your heart, you aren’t in any position to call anyone stupid, dear. If you haven’t got the common sense to realize that the Walton’s can’t make all that money without man power, and recognize that their refusal to pay a livable wage means that they are knowingly compensating the people they employ, whoever they are and however briefly they remain in that position, at a rate that any adult is going to need to rely on federal assistance if they are to sustain themselves, you have no business having a college degree. The company is turning 16 billion in profits annually for the Waltons because they are minimizing their expenses by letting federal entitlements, funded by YOUR TAX DOLLARS, make up the difference between what it costs their employees to live and the paltry wage they are willling to pay. Your views are so grossly distorted that you actually think your contempt should be directed to those below you, when in reality its the folks above you who are pissing down on you without even going to the trouble of trying to pass it off as rain. You wouldn’t know your best interest if it jumped up and bit you.
Nobody cares how much you have ? I bet I have more wealth than you but who cares. Unless you made 14.7 billion in profit and depend on us helping to pay their salaries if you do then we hate you for being a greedy all other dislike of you comes from being arrogant and hateful.lol
You think there are tons of jobs waiting for these hundreds of thousands of people? Find a different job? What kind of fantasy world do you live in? As a health care professional, I see many of these folks in the clinic I work in….uninsured, but making more than Medicaid will allow them to make in order to obtain Medicaid (because our governor won’t allow federal funds to expand medicaid.) Walmart will not give them enough hours for them to get the benefit of insurance and paid time off. That is what they do. The majority of Walmart employees are not allowed to work full time. In and Out Burgers and Costco don’t require any special skills to work there either, however they pay their employees over $10 an hour and give benefits. You obviously don’t know anyone living in poverty.
AMEN!! Very well said! No one is twisting people’s arms to force them to work for Wal-Mart. If the wages aren’t high enough for them, GET AN EDUCATION and work somewhere else!
Adam… not in direct reply to you…
Walmart (and other similar national or local companies) supply hundreds of thousands of their nearby economies with increases in local tax revenues. While many communities offer Walmart “sweetheart deals” (tax abatement), overall the company supplies jobs, income and revenues that more than offset any subsidies provided by “big government.” Also, if you personally pay taxes at the local level(seems we all do), would you not expect your local economy to grow? If not, then there is no help for you. Enjoy your poverty.
While I agree that the conditions and pay aren’t enough, the employees there have a choice. You can work there and make enough to pay bills or you can be homeless. I would work there too if I needed to. In Wal-Mart’s defense they may had a lot of profit but if they paid every employee what we think is fair they would go bankrupt. Can you imagine if all those people where unemployed? I would rather give the people who are working and trying to make a better life for themselves food stamps and government aid then those who choice to be homeless because they don’t want to work.
Minimum Wage was never meant to = serfdom. Being able to support yourself, & your family, with dignity, was the basic intent from the beginning.
Walmart could afford to grant people full time status so they would have insurance and time off. They could afford to pay $10.00 an hour. I take care of many of these people in the clinic I work in and many of them ARE homeless. They make 7 bucks an hour and are only granted 20-25 hours per week of work. The rest of the time, they are looking for a second job, or just trying to survive on the streets.
Yea….SURE….When wages go up, so does everything else. It’s futile! Raising the minimum wage will NOT fix it! Have you people ever taken an economics class for Christ’s sake????? I don’t have the answer, but raising minimum wage ‘AIN’T IT’!
If Walmart paid their employees a living wage, your precious cheap crap you buy in their stores would go up by very little. Everyone deserves a living wage. And, yes, I have taken an economics class and there are a great deal of leading economists who are supportive of increasing the minimum wage. Good for you that you worked so hard to get your degree. I did too…but not everyone has the ability to get a higher education. Not everyone is smart enough to get a higher degree. Not everyone is meant to. Someone has to serve you all that cheap crap you buy. That doesn’t mean they shouldn’t have enough money to pay their bills – and 10 bucks an hour is hardly a lot of money. Do you think the CEO’s of these companies should be making billions of dollars off of the backs of their employees? If everyone had a higher degree, there would be a lot of out of work people with college degrees, or there would be a lot more college degreed people working in very low paying jobs.
My “precious cheap crap”??? Number, I don’t waste my money on “precious cheap crap” from places like Wal-Mart, and THAT’S why I CAN afford to pay my bills. And number 2, where’s you statistics that the price would go up very little if Wal-Mart employees were paid more money? You are just voicing you ‘opinion’ of what you THINK which means nothing. And to say everyone doesn’t have the ‘ability’ to get a higher education, well that’s bullshit too. If you are poor, MY tax dollars pay for it, if you’re rich, then mommy and daddy pay for it, and if you’re middle class like we are, you have the ability to bust your ass to work two jobs, be resourceful and frugal, and pay for it yourself, OR get student loans and never pay them back after you become financially secure like 1000s of graduates have done, and then have Obama ‘forgive’ those debts so the taxpayer picks up the tabs, so don’t EVEN think that “not everyone has the opportunity to get a higher education”. I taught at the college level and have had students who suffered from ‘severe’ OCD, dyslexia, dysgraphia, M.S., Spina Bifida, single mothers, limited-English-speacking students, my God son, who was adopted and a fetal alcohol syndrome baby with severe learning disabilities, (went to trade school) even my BFF/housekeeper who raised and support 3 children with no help from her ‘minimum wage’ X-husband until, at the age of 40, and with my help, went to college to get her degree so she could go to work in the health-care field and make more money, (Just built her $150,000 dream home and doing most of the work themselves to save money…a very hard-working, resourceful woman) and I cold go on and on and on, but they had something that most ‘minimum wage workers’ don’t have…..AMBITION! The desire to rise above and make a better life for themselves and their children! This is AMERICA for Christ’s sake! We still, or for the time being anyway, have the greatest society in the world, and there are opportunities for everyone who are willing to work for them. So don’t tell me that these hard-working and dedicated students don’t deserve to make more than those who are satisfied to work for a minimum wage and then complain that it’s not enough to live on. Everyone has the ability and the means to make a better life for themselves if only they have the AMBITION to do so, and if they don’t, then they work at Wal-Mart, if they are LUCKY to get a job there, for the rest of their lives, IF they are willing to work that long, and they are entitled to government benefits to subsidize their wages. Either way, those of us who have worked our asses off to have what we have, are the ones who pay for it. If Wal-Mart paid them more, we’d have to pay higher prices for “the cheap crap” we buy there as well as for the food we eat and the clothes we wear, and if they don’t, our tax dollars will continue to support them. Either way, you can bet your sweet ass that 99.9 % of Wal-Mart employees are still eating well, have a place to live, wearing decent clothes, have money for entertainment, and have every techie gadget such as computers, lap tops, cell phones, etc. available. And that honey is a FACT!!
The greatest society in the world? You must not read much about world economics and quality of life issues. There are several countries that are ahead of the US in quality of life – take Canada, Sweden, Australia, and Norway, for instance. Not everyone is smart enough to get a higher education. Not everyone is as lucky as your housekeeper who had your help. There are school districts in this country with very few resources and the children don’t have a chance to get out of poverty. It’s hard to have ambition and to learn the skills needed to get by as an adult when you’ve grown up without enough food. Again, not everybody is meant to have a higher education. You need people to be in service work and retail. Does that mean they should live in poverty? Do you honestly believe 99.9% of the people working at Walmart are eating well? Are you really that clueless? There are companies that do fine and pay their employees a good wage. Take a look at Costco In and Out Burgers. There are countries that are doing fine paying a much higher minimum wage than in this country….Australia, for instance, pays a minimum of 16 per hour and they somehow escaped the economic recession felt in the rest of the world. They also provide grants for students to receive a higher education. Do you think it’s fair that 85 people in the world have as much money as the 3.5 billion poorest? Do you think the widening gap between the rich and the poor is the way we need to keep going? Having lived in a developing country, I can honestly say the US is moving more in the direction of the 3rd world where there is a lot of money at the top while the rest of the people have no food. A higher education won’t get you shit when that happens. We are quickly becoming modern day slaves to the rich slave master. Take a look at this upworthy video…http://www.upworthy.com/the-shocking-truth-about-what-it-would-cost-us-all-if-walmart-paid-living-wage There is a great documentary about hunger in this country called “A Place at The Table.” But it probably wouldn’t interest someone like you, who doesn’t believe there are people going hungry in this country.
Sure Gianine Carbone, you just keep watching those bullshit ‘propaganda’ documentaries and believing what you want. I didn’t say I didn’t believe people in this country aren’t going hungry. I said If 99.9% of people working at Wal-Mart ARE going hungry, it’s because they are spending their paychecks on cigarettes, cellphones with internet access and beer for damned sure! And as for those poor school districts, again…..the children are suffering because their parents have NO AMBITION, but those children HAVE the opportunities to get out of that if ONLY they have the ambition and drive, yet probably most won’t because of the same reason’s their parents didn’t. This government, rather than encouraging people to start at the bottom and work their way to the top, has become a society that rewards people for being lazy and immoral and has made them to believe that those of us who WORK for a living somehow OWE it to them to care for them too while they sit on their asses and do nothing to better themselves. It is NOT the government’s responsibility to care for those who are too damned lazy to care for themselves! It’s bleeding hearts like you who are turning murderers and rapist lose onto the streets because, ‘the poor things had no chance in life and it’s not fair for them to have to go to prison and suffer’. BULLSHIT!! If you think that there are so many countries so much greater than ours, pack your ass up and go there!! It’s people like you who have caused the demise of this once great country with your way of thinking in the first place. People are poor in this country because of ‘well intended, socialist minded, bleeding hearted people like you, who think that EVERYONE deserves to be equal and those who WORK hard for it, should have to share with those who don’t. My husband started at a minimum wage job, jut like everyone else and worked himself up to a 6 figure income even thought it took 23 years, and as a kid, I worked with my mother at an egg farm gathering eggs for 50 cents an hour. I KNEW I didn’t want to spend my life working that way, so I strove to do better. When I attended a small, poor, country school as a kid, no one gave me free lunches, or back-pack school supplies, and my family didn’t get food stamps and free cell phones, so I knew if I wanted it, I’d have to WORK for it, and I did, and no bleeding heart liberal like you is EVER going to make ME feel guilty that those who are more than able to work towards bettering themselves but don’t deserve for me to sacrifice so that they can have all the things that I’ve had to work hard to have! And you don’t have much confidence in the people of this country if you truly believe that “not everyone is smart enough to get a higher education”. If they truly are that learning disabled, then they are drawing a ‘crazy check’ like some of my special ed. high school students used to call it, when I worked in public schools before getting my Master’s to work on the college level. Like I’ve said, you just keep on drinking that Kool Aid honey and believing the ‘great lie’ while because of thinking like yours, our government keeps those ‘poor people’ on the welfare roles and working those minimum wage jobs so that they will vote Democrat because they believe that people like me, OWE them something!
Wow…thanks for the reality check. I have seen the light! Keep watching Fox because it has obviously taught you a great deal.
Fox???? Nah. I don’t watch those ‘propaganda programs’. I choose to form my own opinions from READING and WATCHING real life rather than being indoctrinated by the ‘boob tube’. That must be YOUR problem honey, too many reality shows and Oprah.
Don’t have a TV. I’m sorry for assuming you must watch Fox since your opinions are so closely aligned with theirs. I just form my views from reading, working in public health, and working to help people who are in dire straits…people without cell phones or internet…many of them homeless and very sick. But I’m sure it’s their own fault since they have no ambition. They are just abusing the system and using our hard earned tax dollars. Those poor people really are horrible. Thanks for enlightening me. I should go into working for a for-profit entity so I can feel better about myself.
Well there ya go! EXACTLY!! And while you’re at it, (and I’m sure you’re knocking down a ‘little more’ than minimum wage), why don’t you just give them about 1/2 YOUR paycheck every week so they CAN afford a cell phone and internet, or invite a few over to stay at your house so they won’t be homeless. THEN I’d be impressed with what you do for a living, and you really COULD feel good about yourself! Otherwise, as long as you aren’t donating your services for FREE, then I see you’ve got no reason to be so ‘high and mighty’ about what you do for a living. Like it is said, ‘the road to hell is paved with good intentions.’ You are paid, and I’m sure very well, and probably with MY tax dollars if you’re working for a “non-profit” organization, so what are you trying to prove? That you can work for $30+ an hour and go home at the end of the day to all the luxuries of life, but just because you work with people like that, it somehow makes you so wonderful? SMH… Like I said, put your money where your mouth is. Donate your paycheck to them every week, turn off YOUR cell phone, turn down YOUR thermostat, sell your car and take public transportation, do without food and get down on their level and do without, so they can live a better life off of YOUR hard work, and I’d be impressed with you. And DON’T fricking tell me that you do just to make yourself look good, cause I AIN’T buying that one! hahahaha
Actually, I’m paid pretty lousy, don’t have a car and I ride my bike to work…living in a tiny apartment and just getting by paying my bills. I’ve got no savings. I have a small window unit that I use sparingly. I don’t have a housekeeper. I don’t make over 30 an hour – wish I did, but I’ve chosen to work in a rewarding job which is lower pay…but my life is not the point. I don’t need to be living on the streets to feel compassion for people who have less than me. I see them every day and am grateful for what I have. I’m no higher and mightier than thou…just have a bit more understanding and empathy for people who are struggling. You are just mean.
You have a degree and work in the healthcare field, but CHOOSE to work for low wages and barely get by because you are such a compassionate and wonderful person…. Yea….I get it now. RIGHT 😉 You win.
Yes – I’ve made the decision that working in a rewarding job is worth less pay. I’d rather live simply and not have a lot of “things.” I don’t think it makes me a wonderful person. It just is what it is.
Oooooo-kkk. I said ‘you win’. What more do you want? I understand now.
And probably that’s the same reason people work at Wal-Mart for low
wages, and they live simply without having the money to buy a lot of
‘things’. They find it a ‘rewarding’ job (I noticed you didn’t use the
word ‘career’) to serve people of the community. And so it doesn’t make
them ‘poor’; it’s just what they do.
I’m done. You obviously have no concern for people who are underserved and in poverty. I doubt very seriously anybody at Walmart finds it to be a rewarding job. I am fortunate and grateful that I have a choice…. to have a place to live, a job, and food to eat. Living in a third world country taught me how lucky I am (and yes…it was a volunteer gig.) I found myself being embarrassed to be an American because most of the natives and the ex-pats from other countries thought everyone in America resembles you.
Well, pat yourself on the back “Mother Teresa”, but you have no more right to speak for the employees of Wal-Mart about how they ‘feel’ about their employment there than you do about how “I” feel about anything. So it’s about TIME that “you’re done”! And like I said earlier, any time you feel too “embarrassed to be an American”, you are welcome to pack your shit and get the hell out of here. So sayonara, adiau, farvel, adios, kwa heri, arrivederci, or as we say down here in the South, “don’t let the door hit you in the ass, honey”!!
wow
Judyboodie, I’ve watched your nonsense too long. I consider you a disgusting excuse for a human being. Southern charm is not your strong suit, but southern ignorance and bigotry are traits you’ve perfected! I too grew up poor and worked my way out – but I didn’t lose my humanity in the process. Your mean-spirited posts demonstrate an incredible lack of empathy or compassion! Calling some who IS devoting their life to working with those less fortunate “Mother Tereas” in your snarky tone just goes to show one thing – yes, you lose, in all that counts. You are the epitome of the tea party loser, who thinks only of themselves and spends their time blaming the victims. Socialism is why we have roads, public hospitals – many good things… So calling helping others socialism is not the insult you think it is, in your pitiful ignorance! ?Raising the minimum wage has NEVER had the effect you predict (study history) but it would raise many out of the terrible poverty you look down on! I pity you your nasty mind – it must be a terrible place to live, filled with evil and anger and blame!
Well said Liberal Tess. I am a white independent male from Georgia and it is bad enough for you to hear this continual stream of hate and ignorance that they use here with a choice to turn your computer off but I have to live with these dumb azz people who if you know and find out about most of them or a good % either are or have. Accepted some form of welfare from Gov’t. It is alrigjt fof them because well it is them but if it happens to you here comes the soap box and they want to portray you as lazy, druggie or living off the government.
No maybe not it is because they are like a cancer when they come into a cummunity. In rural areas they have a monopoly on the buisiness.( I thought was against the law) They work at Walmart because Walmart got their old job and they could sot at home and draw welfare they work fulltime but still need gov’t aid.
The 1950 ‘ s and 1960’s Ford and GM employeed the most employees in the US and they paid enough fr those workers to live in middle class, their wives stayed at home with their children, Take the family on a vacation and be still be able to save enough money for their kids college education What was the Tax rate on the 1% back then ( 90%).
Fastforward until today the largest employer in the US is Walmart and their employees work for minimum wage , provide no health insurance for them. Then depend on taxpayers to help pay their payroll. They are already set up to avoid the estate tax when a Walton dies. They will pay more to get out of taxes than if they would just do their civic duty.
If Walmart did not have congress on their payroll and had competition as lousy as their products are I believe if taxpayers would help build me a store help subsidize my payroll and on on I would put their sorry butt out of buisiness. If every Walmart shut down tomorrow it would bring a smile to my face the Waltons are socialist.. I will never set foot in their stores.
‘BLACK FRIDAY’ a nationwide boycott of Walmart . Buy somewhere else for Christmas watch the Waltons squirm kn their filthy greed.
I am curious are you a christian do you attend church? Ever read the new testament?
Why and how and the hell can you defend the owners of Walmart in this situation. Walmart is the scum of the earth. I made 49,000 last year before taxes and you are going to tell me the Waltons who by the way PROFITTED 14.7 BILLION last year alone want me to pay their employees salaries because it is obvious they just simply don’t want to. Your moral compass is in a Walmart toilet.
Tell me how they or you can justify that.? If I was in Congress the Waltons would be paying every cent back plus intrest.
Where I live they come into a town and shut down all stores. Paint store gone, electrical store gone, plumbing store gone, appliance stores gone. Some of those people probably made 15 hr working in their mom and pop store but now has to feel lucky to take Walmarts crappy minimum wage job because uless they drive 75 miles each way Walmart is the only employer in town
The only reason Target and K Mart are still open the few that are anyway is because Walmart allows them just to get caught monopoly which they are. They swindle and weasel out of paying their fair share of taxes. Wal mart and you defending them makes me want to puke because you know it is those damn workers who are causing them to be the greedy slime they are.
You dumb ass! I’m not defending Walmart! Can’t you READ? I’m defending those who have worked hard and long to ‘rise above’ so they don’t have to work for minimum wages at places like Walmart. But your tiny pea brain just couldn’t read what I said and even comprehend it. SMH.
. If Wal-Mart paid them more, we’d have to pay higher prices for “the cheap crap” we buy there as well as for the food we eat and the clothes we wear, and if they don’t, our tax dollars will continue to support them. Either way, you can bet your sweet ass that 99.9 % of Wal-Mart employees are still eating well, have a place to live, wearing decent clothes, have money for entertainment, and have every techie gadget such as computers, lap tops, cell phones, etc. available. And that honey is a FACT!!
I thought the article was about Walmart employees getting gov’t assistance because they are under paid by the Waltons who made 14.7 billion in profits last year. So your anger goes after the worker for not being like you, and my anger goes after the one who has the money to keep this from happening but rather I pay for it.
Everybody cannot be a boss. You have to have workers , so what if all companies did this? You are Okay with helping pay their salaries? The man or woman who has nothing and work for Walmart and need help to live you are disgusted with but the family that is one of the wealthiest in the world you have no problem with them hording every penny they have and live off of taxpayers . Do you know Walmart has captured the Welfare market as well letting it be known to shop at their stores they accept all on gov’t aid. How nice of them since they are causing it.
Everything you have posted no criticism of the Waltons. This is 2016 not 1950. Greed is alright for you huh? If they can manipulate or buy an advamtage you don’t have a problem with it all falls on their employees? I think I have understood you perfectly. How sad a person you must be . Most people have a moral compass.
You are a Fox news watcher I bet. You are just like the conservatives who complain about these employees then tell the world how you are self sufficient ? I heard that from conservatives in Louisiana until it flooded now all I hear is ” Where is help, why ain’t nobody helping us.” When its you it is alright but for everybody else no?
Well why don’t you enlighten me on what the article was about? What I read it was about Walmart making an insane amount of profits but want taxpayers to help pay for their employees to live?
It was not about why Walmart employees are not college grads or why they work their. I suggest maybe you should touch up on your reading comprehension. Lets take a look back at your comments.
Yea….SURE….When wages go up, so does everything else. It’s futile! Raising the minimum wage will NOT fix it! Have you people ever taken an economics class for Christ’s sake????? I don’t have the answer, but raising minimum wage ‘AIN’T IT’!.
Now that sure sounds like a position Walmart would take .I am saying Walmart should raise their salary enough to keep their employees from having to get assistance Please check and see if the Walton family can survive with an overall net wealth of 150 billion dollars. Because I need my money maybe I could pay my for college.
Again you made this comment…… “If Wal-Mart paid them more, we’d have to pay higher prices for “the cheap crap” we buy there as well as for the food we eat and the clothes we wear, and if they don’t, our tax dollars will continue to support them. Either way, you can bet your sweet ass that 99.9 % of Wal-Mart employees are still eating well, have a place to live, wearing decent clothes, have money for entertainment, and have every techie gadget such as computers, lap tops, cell phones, etc. available. And that honey is a FACT!!
Some Walmart employees have a college degree.
You said you were a teacher how did you become such an expert on how they live and what they own because I don’t have any idea?
Again that sounds like a defense of Walmart and no we are not envious of their wealth but how much money does somebody need . they cannot take money from their 14.7 billion they made last year and raise the pay and not raise prices? 10 billion do you think you’re camily could live off of next year? Their will always be bosses and workers everybody cannot be a boss just pay the worker just and give him or her dignity.
The article was about Walmart making insane profits but letting taxpayers provide financial help in order for them to live? Where did you read in this article anything about whether those employees ever went to college or why they choose to work for Walmart?.
Hey Hateful person are you telling the truth about being a teacher because your reading comprehension is terrible?
http://www.forbes.com/sites/adamhartung/2012/10/10/want-a-better-economy-history-says-vote-democrat/
It’s time for a revolution. Elites purposely keep us in poverty because of greed.
The High Cost of Low prices!
Looks to me like Wal-Mart and the Waltons don’t know the meaning of “greed.”
1. Yes indeed, Walmart employees should be paid more.
2. Federal taxpayers do not subsidize Walmart employees.
3. All federal spending is created when the govt instructs banks to mark up recipients’ bank accounts. This is how all federal spending occurs. This process does not require the federal govt to acquire tax receipts or borrow back its own IOU’s.
4. If the federal govt runs a deficit with its (yearly) spending, it sells securities in the open market to drain bank reserves and reduce the prospects of (uncontrollable) inflation. (A bit of inflation is necessary so that people buy today, rather than tomorrow. Too many “tomorrows” in delaying spending creates DEFLATION in the economy. Deflation is much worse than inflation as it brings the economy to its knees as in late 2008/early 2009.)
5. Federal taxes manage aggregate demand, they do not “fund” the federal government.
“Walmart receives an estimated $6.2 billion annually in mostly federal taxpayer subsidies”
Homeowners receive an estimated $131 billion annually in federal taxpayer subsidies.
So I say, STFU.
Because of how Walmart treats its employees, I refuse to ever set foot in any of their stores. The Walton family makes billions on the backs of their destitute employees while they live in opulence. What a disgrace!!!
people are so naive.
Steamer Steve knows what the hell he is talking about an excellent post . Thanks that was very informative . I don’ t know why our misguided friends on the right do not understand supply and demand?
What is even sadder is no matter where you get your facts they ignore it as liberal bias? Lol if Jesus himself gave them those facts they would tell him his liberal bias has ruined this country.