There are a few reasons for that. First is that walmart is one of the biggest employers in the US and some people need those things called jobs. Also Walmart would be a company that can employ people from the least skilled up to the skilled people who handle the higher up functions of the company. Just because Walmart pays their retail employees like dung does not mean that they do not employ skilled workers nationwide for a number of purposes at reasonable salaries. Still, many of the people who find retail work in Walmart simply need the job.
Yes, I remembered the last time I needed a job, it was brutal. It took me about a month to even get a call, even with speaking to managers face to face. I was never rejected, just ignored and passed over. It really sucked. However, the final result of simple perseverance was a bigger pay off than I ever would have received at walmart. This was also back when I had no degree, no applicable job skills, and no real experience. It can be done. It's more difficult, but it's worth it.
This leads to why Walmart is able to be such a crappy employer, and there is little the employees can do about it. Simply most employees in a specific walmart store are unable to walk out and strike. They live from paycheck to paycheck or less, and cannot afford to lose that crappy paycheck. Despite what republicans claim the government does not provide the poor with living for nothing. The other way Walmart prevents problems for themselves is because a large portion of their customers cannot go anywhere else either. Walmart is simply cheap, and many poor people shop there. So even if the customers wanted to back the employees through their own boycotts it just won't work because many of their customers simply cannot just start shopping somewhere else because they cannot afford it.
Of course there is. While accepting the crappy conditions and pay, you look for better work on your off time. When you finally get the new job, you tell walmart to suck it, and live much happier than before under a real employer. I understand how walmart operates. It's a parasite, an infection that ruins small towns. Without employees they cannot succeed, which is why I highly recommend that people avoid that ****hole like the plague it is. Sure, they offer an immediate position and a regular check, but it isn't worth it.
Retail work at Walmart is an active and hard job. These are not lazy people trying to live off the government dime. Republicans love to claim that they are for the worer who chooses a job over welfare, but the reality is that Walmart doesn't pay their hard working employees enough to put them above the poverty levels for public assistance. walmart is a prime example that the free market simply does not take care of the workers. Because of that we all pick up the slack for Walmart's rich owners and investors. We end up having to give Walmart employees public assistance. These are working people, not some deadbeat hanging out at home on the public dime. These are not the "victims" Romney spoke of. These people took a job to have a job even though it does not pay all their bills. Sure they are probably looking for better, but better is not always out there for you.
I'm not saying they're bad people, they're just people who made a bad choice and took the first offer by a company who profits off of that desperation and misery. There is always better. It just takes faith and persistence. The outlook that things will be better, and that you are worth more than some floor sweep at America's equivalent to a sweatshop.
Should a person do an important job for a company and still not have enough money to get by on even when sacrificing and buying as cheap as possible? Without the employees walmart would not run. The owner of walmart does not stock shelves, run checkout, or even manage a single walmart. Those jobs are done by other people, and that allows him to do whatever it is he does during the day. They should up the pay for their employees. Not only would it benefit them, but it would help us taxpayers out also. Giving the Walmart employee the ability to consume would drive up the economy everywhere. We would save on taxes because we would not have to help the employed stay above water. On top of that the increased consumption would provide more tax revenue. Instead Walmart Owners get rich while underpaying their employees and we pic up the tab for them. By we i mean those of us who pay taxes.
I know how a corporation works. It's a publicly traded company, which means their particular focus is on the shareholder. Walmart is the perfect example of business ethics done wrong. The problem with walmart is that they have created an environment where they don't have to give a ****. They don't need customer service, or employee benefits, because the attitude is that they're the only option for the destitute. That's not true, people just think it is. The reality of the situation is that it's just more convenient. Walmart offers no real advantage to anyone except for the people who profit from it. It's one of those rare occasions where I would love to see a company fail.
This is one of those times where collective bargaining is not just important to the walmart employee who wants to survive on their employment, but it is also going to help us out in passing the responsibility for their employees back to the people who hired them. If you want the market to handle these things then we have to start pushing on places like Walmart and forcing an actual living wage for their employees.
Maybe a strike would work, maybe walmart just pays off the union reps to shut up and go back to work. The only real way to affect walmart is to boycott. If you don't give them money, they have to do something about it. Unfortunately, people choose convenience over ethics.