Disclaimer

Awesome. Now how many employ college grads (or pays a living wage/benefits per the poverty standards set by the gov't)? How much revenue do they bring to the city vs. the burden placed on it? How many employees of those establishment reside in the city that employs them? How is the housing market in that area before and after?

Good <--> Bad is on a continuum. I agree there are some short-term positive effects, but they don't outweigh the long term negative effects. I guess that's the point I was trying to drive at. If Walmart comes in and employs 120 new "associates", but displaces 200 other local jobs, then is that a win? I guess it depends on your perspective. The selfish consumer says it's a win because it's "market efficiency" and "lower prices" -- that's what they see, they don't see the hidden costs of their tax dollars now supporting the 200 families that've been displaced (in addition to some of the 120 that don't make a living wage), or if they don't get on the taxpayer dime, they've drastically reduced their discretionary spending (affecting other local businesses), downsized their homes, and now the town has a reduced tax-base because home and property values go down. Life isn't always as explicit as a mathematical formula. These analyses can be performed, but it takes years sometimes to determine whether it's correlation or causation, in addition to statistically eliminating other potential factors in play. And that's not why I'm not a fan. Emotions aren't a factor for me... granted they are for a lot of people which is why people use anecdotes and empathy stories as persuasive devices. Not going to work on enginerds, but not everyone is an enginerd. And while casting judgment, what would you have done in Sally's situation? How do we prevent this from happening in the future or mitigate the effects of this happening? So, why don't we just take that thought exercise to the point and just say people making less than $50k/yr shouldn't have kids? Or people without the $200k set aside to raise a child BEFORE they have one, can't have kids?

Your problems have been solved... by GM... back in 1992. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GMC_Typhoon AWD for winter Robust 4.3L w/ Turbo for making your naughty bits tingle Unless you totally let it go BTS, the market has hit the price floor for these rarity/collector vehicles.

I'm not straying. The facts are: 1) Woman had a job making ends meet 2) Walmart came in, depressed wages, she no longer has employment that can sustain her lifestyle. 3) Consider the type of lifestyle one can have making $15/hr and raising 5 kids... I'm sure it's not steak tartar each night in their 3000sq ft home. 4) What sacrifices do you make as a parent that wouldn't detrimentally affect your kids? I get the whole business cycle and capitalism and whatnot, but there comes a point, or a line in the sand, where it becomes destructive to society. We as Americans need to decide if we want the country divided into haves and have nots, part of the country first-world, and part second- or third-world. I tell you what I don't want - I don't want college education to become a commodity where that's the minimum standard, because that'll make another barrier to enter society in the labor market and saddle people with debt they'll never be able to pay off in their lifetimes. So, in order to keep that from happening, there need to be opportunities for the lesser educated to make a LIVING wage in order to survive without gov't assistance. If they want to better their lives by pursuing further education or opening up their own business, then that's an option, but you don't want the only options to be "welfare or college" especially since there are no guarantees that a college degree == a job or more $$$, and now there's additional debt these people have to pay. Not to mention making all other college degrees worth less because everyone has one... it no longer serves as a tool to differentiate people. Not that a degree is the only rubric for hiring, but it's a differentiator. I think you struggle with the fact that there are more people like her that are the norm, than people like you.

I was a huge Veloster fan after watching the Rallycross and it appeared to be a pretty cool hatchback, but there are some issues that make it not so ready for primetime. That's the major one... http://www.autoguide.com/auto-news/2012/10/hyundai-veloster-under-safety-investigation-for-exploding-sunroof.html But the infotainment cluster and the DCT have issues as well. It may be a good car for the price, and I'm sure Hyundai dealers would fix the issues under warranty, but if it spends more time in the shop than in my garage, it's more of a hassle than it's worth.

Who ordered the move?

No!

Lets get one thing straight. I'm a horrible person on AND off the internet. You can't take that away from me. And I could care less about the "emotions". I'm not a 'bleeding heart'-type of guy... if I was, I'd have 40M pets to take care of because of those damn ASPCA commercials and Sarah Mclachlan songs. I look at the facts, which is why my concern was comparing the delta between her old wage/benefits to the current wage/benefits. The one where she was make ends meet, and the one where that's no longer feasible. I'm not faulting Wallyworld for her way of emotionally coping with it. True. How much money should you set aside for losing your job when you're living paycheck to paycheck? Because what it ends up boiling down to is judgement of others' on what they've chosen to do w/ their life. Some people choose $15/hr jobs because higher education doesn't suit them (or a liberal arts degree ), or because they want to be mothers'/fathers' and spend more time raising their kids... others choose to pursue Masters and Doctorates because that's what they enjoy or aspire the lifestyle that comes along with those accolades. So again, when you're making $15/hr and living paycheck to paycheck with 5 kids... how much should you set aside for emergencies? What do you sacrifice to make those savings? Want to judge her for having 5 kids, then I suppose we should implement some income criteria for having kids...? I dunno. Or are you just saying you're just happy to have the smug satisfaction of judging someone who may/may not have made the same choices as you?

Subaru BRZ (either new, or just barely used (<8k) for a small price break) Pros: New, warrantied, quality build, fun, decent MPG. Cons: Insurance, winter

How do you want to solve that problem? She HAD a living wage apparently... so, you want to do income-based sterilization? I don't think that'll sit well with the pro-life church-going crowd. What if I base my budget / lifestyle on my current wage, then all of a sudden it's cut 40%? Should we just make everyone start living on 50% of their pay in order to account for that?

And if people and Walmart are so confident in the "vote with your dollars" argument, why are they so scared of a couple peaceful protests within peoples' Constitutional rights? http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/19/business/wal-mart-files-with-nlrb-to-block-union-backed-protests.html?pagewanted=1&ref=business&_r=1&

The Wal-Mart effectIts Chinese imports have displaced nearly 200,000 U.S. jobs http://www.epi.org/publication/ib235/ http://www.businesspundit.com/stats-on-walmart/ Supersizing Supercenters? The Impact of Wal-Mart Supercenters on Body Mass Index and Obesity http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1263316 Pulitzer prize winning articles on the effects of Walmart (both good and bad) via LA Times http://www.pulitzer.org/works/2004-National-Reporting But the most telling/sad thing is I specifically searched for "Positive Things about Walmart" and the links above are what showed up. And, just so we're clear... Walmart's official corporate position was backing Obamacare. So, keep that in mind.

It's almost as bad as the war on typewriters...

These are the same idiots that voted this guy in, and we trust them to vote w/ their dollars too? Right?

You know something is up when people swear that Obama destroys all other businesses and yet Walmart is still thriving. Then it obviously stands to reason that Walmart is liberal and socialist and must be stopped to save America. Right?

Interesting... that's why stupid and disingenuous guys with PhDs at institutions of higher learning devote their time to that very issue... http://laborcenter.berkeley.edu/retail/walmart.pdf Rebuttal to you Dr. Swingset.

I can tolerate 4 more years of GOP whining...

I'll give Walmart credit on their business model... have the gov't subsidize their healthcare. Walmart's healthcare plan is Medicaid. So, I suppose if I'm going to pay taxes to provide the poor with healthcare, then they should be able to provide me some discounts.

Did you bother reading my link? Well, considering that communities can grow and be sustainable when you pay your workers a living wage where they can afford to buy the products they produce... that'd be a benefit. And again, it's a race to the bottom if the unions weren't there to at least keep the companies in check. Even the non-union people benefit from the labor agreements, benefit packages, and working conditions the unions have fought for. I know a lot of people enjoy having vacation days. There's the "damned if you do, damned if you don't" issue. No pleasing people. The unions make concessions and they're "screwing the younger members", but if they don't they're "greedy union thugs". If I've put in 20 years and promised a pension after 10yrs of service and a certain hourly wage for my labor, why would I give that up?

Kind of interesting that they're heading south of the Mason-Dixon for "cheap" labor.. history repeating itself? There are a few reasons why foreign automakers don't have unions, but to say "They don't need a union" discounts the fact that they are run the way they are run BECAUSE of the unions like the UAW. And, honestly, if your source of income was from a non-union job, you'd be crazy to start talking about a union. Despite the fact that anti-union propaganda is everywhere from management, but as soon as you speak of unionizing and being a supporter thereof, you might as well paint a target on your back. Others' might agree with you, but you'd never know. Even if they did agree, most of them are too spineless to stand up for their beliefs either if it meant potentially sacrificing their jobs. Would you argue politics with your boss if you disagree with him/her? How Germany Builds Twice as Many Cars as the U.S. While Paying Its Workers Twice as Much http://www.forbes.com/sites/frederickallen/2011/12/21/germany-builds-twice-as-many-cars-as-the-u-s-while-paying-its-auto-workers-twice-as-much/

I haven't watched it.. but it seemed relevant to this thread. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jazb24Q2s94 [ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jazb24Q2s94][/ame]

FormatFactory might do it. Really easy program to use.

And...? So, just because it's happening to everyone else makes it ok for the greed to continue to perpetuate? This is exactly why unions still need to exist. It's the only thing left that forces "big business" to honor their commitments to the little guy. The ones without unions still need that fear of unions to keep them honest. This "suck it up and bear it" is a tired sad song sung by the ones who don't have to sacrifice (management) and jealousy from the rest of the non-union crowd that "If I have to sacrifice and get boned by mgmt, then everyone else should have to as well". That's a sad selfish way of thinking. You think if I went to the bank and asked to modify my mortgage because everyone else was doing it and getting foreclosed on, they'd let me? Disagree. They did exactly what they should've done if someone didn't honor a contract agreement.

OMG, the job creators' secret recipe is out... how will they ever create more jobs? What's next recipes for Outback Bloomin' Onions? It'll go under next.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJNR2EpS0jw