Walmart is reportedly cutting 3,500 co-manager positions and adding 1,700 lower-paid assistant store managers.
The restructuring comes the day after Walmart announced it will raise its starting hourly wages to $11.
Walmart also announced Thursday that it would close 63 Sam's Club stores in a move that would impact roughly 9,400 employees.
I worked in a unionized retail job and the union was good for the employees. The job paid the equivalent of $17.00 per hour in today's dollars. The union pay allowed me to pay for my education in finance and take care of my family at the same. I now work for Walmart. However, there is no way I could have paid for school working for the $4.25 per hour that Walmart was paying at the time. Unions are now nearly powerless in the competition for company profit when compared to the asset owners. I was luck to have a union job, which raised my family out of poverty, as it did for many before me.
And this is why Amazon should stay out of brick-and-mortar retail. The arguing going back and forth about the economics of minimum wage and underperforming business locations are stomach turning. Entitlement mentality is real, there will never be enough that can be given to people to satisfy them, whether it be from an employer or from government. Why would any company want to deal with this?
“Walmart needs to unionize.” Seriously? Have you studied what damage unions have done to companies and their employees? Unionization would be a disaster for employees.
“Mexicanos took our jerbs!” If you can’t comprehend labor market economics, that’s your problem. Making stupid South Park jokes about it has zero impact on the reality of supply and demand.
Walmart has been that way for about 20 years. That’s one reason I left. It will not stop at that. Money saved money made.
Yes Wal-Mart is so generous announcing a meager bonus. What they aren't sharing is the fact they are eliminating co-managers before January 31st so they won't have to pay them their bonus. Yes, a bonus they have worked hard for. Worked "mandatoet" extra days for. Good on you Wal-Mart for becoming just another greedy and uncompassionate corporate cog.
Walmart needs to unionize
Calm down angry person!
LOL
Rdv8Feb-1dac
That’s a book!
I’m retired from Walmart. I know longer work for that dysfunctional company. Are you from Arkansas? Lol you seem upset?
Timely.
Regarding high wages and automation https://www.truthrevolt.org/news/californias-sky-high-minimum-wage-set-hurt-poor-jack-box-automates
[eyeroll]
Yes, I’m a capitalist, a system that has undeniably created more wealth than any other on earth. We live in a country with a (mostly) free economy. If you don’t like your job you are free to leave for another one. No one will make you stay.
Regarding automation, high wages drive automation. Fast food restaurants are automating as fast as they can because of the “fight for $15”.
If you want to do something effective that will cause the market wage to increase then fight against the current high rates of immigration. Labor is a good, a product line any other. When there is a surplus prices go down. When there is a shortage, prices go up. It’s Econ 101.
Why do you think companies are always on the side of amnesty and increasing the number of H1B visa workers? To increase the supply of labor and thus keep wages down.
When the labor market is tight then wages will go up to attract labor.
Walmart pays higher wages in areas like Houston, Dallas, and even near the oil fields in North Dakota because they have to compete for labor there.
So, stop agitating for a government solution to force the corporate meanies to pay you more and address the actual cause of wage stagnation.
@1yux Typical Republican Capitalistic answer and you didn’t deny you aren’t one. I happen to be an Independent realist. I can see 10 years down the road and the consequences to the actions made today. You ignore the fact that wages have been suppressed since at least since 2000. If the minimum wage received at least a cost of living adjustment every year since initiated, the minimum wage would be around $15 anyway.
My opinions are forged in reality, observations and injustices of our Corporatist system where the shareholder and profits come first. Workers have become an afterthought to companies. They were once valued as assets. Now they treated like liabilities and tossed like trash to the curb when the leaders mismanage the company as WM has done. It's not the VPs, CEO or Executives that pay the price due to mismanagement, it's the employees in the trenches at the stores.
If the current company direction of automation continues and it’s coming (and this is everywhere), more people will be out of work and the crappy pay will continue because you will have more people fighting for the scraps of the few jobs offered. Let’s say an average store has 200 people working at it. Automation takes over and you need 25 to run a store. What happens to all those people? If they are in their 40s and 50s do they really want to go back to school and go in debt for a career change? Do they collect unemployment as long as they can? Do they get another job for less pay? Or do they just become the uncounted in the unemployment numbers to continue to make those look good? (The unemployment numbers should be at least double what is reported but hey, the economy is great, right?) With more and more people making crappy wages, they don’t have the discretionary money to keep the economy rolling along. With more people buying only necessities, prices will go up anyway so the companies can keep their shareholders happy.
P.S. I worked for WM for 10 years. I saw the writing on the wall when the HO is going through with a flame thrower and gutting everything. I had several escape plans. But I left last year when a better paying job came along. I am one of the lucky casualties of WM.
in my opinion manager that make $50 @hr should not make that much money don't sh=== sit on down all day...
@1yux Been watching a bit of Fox News, eh?
So, you’re a socialist. My oponions are informed by education and experience, not politics, not religion, and damn sure not my “feelings”. No private company is a jobs program. No one is owed a job. People are paid for the value of their work. Stocking shelves isn’t worth more than whatever wage the market sets. Walmart could pay everyone $15/hr and then go out of business as it has to raise prices to cover the wage increase. I hope you don’t work for the company because you’re ignorant about free market economics.
@ndy A livable wage so you don't have to constantly stress yourself out worrying how you'll pay your bills. A wage where you put some money away in case of emergencies and not paycheck to paycheck. Something a Xtian Republican like you wouldn't understand.
So, what is the right wage to get someone to give a sh*t?
The point is you get what you pay for. They are going to pay people to show up. Not give a sh!t.
And? What’s your point? Do you have one or is this another example of driveby snark?