Another way WalMart, Big Box & Warehouse stores are ruining America...

[Yollam]

We all know how Wal-Mart has destroyed small towns with it's cutthroat pricing, tax breaks and eventual price hikes and store closures.

We know how they have forced their suppliers through their buying power to move their production from the US to third world countries, destroying even more jobs here.

We know how they create a landscape of monotony and sameness across the land, and send all their profits to a faraway headquarters.




But it occurred to me that they also contribute to the epidemic of disease and obesity.

The harried consumer, with little time for cooking, and a budget stretched to the limit by stagnant wages and high housing & energy prices, is more and more inclined to get a "good deal" by buying processed, instant or easy-cook foods at the box stores.

Because they are in such bulk that they are impossible to use in a reasonable time frame, consumers are more inclined to buy less perishable items, which they try to gobble up before they expire, even if they are not hungry.

The net effect is that people eat food with more chemicals and preservatives, they eat food that is older and more vitamin-depleted, and they end up eating more of it.

Is it any wonder that the Japanese and Europeans live so long and have such low rates of obesity, when the typical custom there is to buy the groceries for that day while walking home from the train station after work and cook them fresh, and repeat daily?

It's scary to think of what eating all of this old, cruddy food is doing to us...

[bammertheblue]

1. The only thing

I would buy in bulk was toilet paper!

[ingac70]

2. I will not blame them because I am chubby.....

And that is total BS about not being able to find cheaper food elsewhere.

I shop at Aldi and Sav-a-lot, and in the summer I buy veggies from local farmers, better and just as cheap or cheaper than Wal-mart.

I takes initative to do the right things for yourself.

[Yollam]

3. Do you have kids?

Two parents, both working full-time, find it much harder to do that.

I know because I am one. When I was single and a young married, we were able to be fussy about what we ate, and cooked from scratch every night.

Now, with childrearing, homework, etc etc. it is much harder to do so.

If you are have no kids, you couldn't possibly understand.


And as far as placing blame, I blame myself, and our society with its insane obsessions with "efficiency" and "productivity" as much as I blame the stores themselves.

[MercutioATC]

4. But it's not their fault for offering the products.

You choose what you buy. You also choose if "insane obsessions" like "efficiency" and "productivity" are your personal priorities.

Even when I don't have a lot of time (I'm a single parent) I can always throw some chicken breasts on the grill and make a salad.

[DoctorMyEyes]

5. I must respectfully call bullshit

I can't believe this is the second time tonight I've had to come to the defense of my employer - the Costco "Big Box". People eat poorly for a wide variety of reasons. Costco does not promote poor diet choices.

I'm getting to be pretty old, and I don't ever remember, in my lifetime, Americans walking home from work picking up their daily groceries. Our landscape, for whatever it's worth, is not as conducive to such a European practice. And that's not the "big boxes" faults.

Though - I suddenly remembered something.... Wasn't the whole "big box" concept in America adopted from the European model? Carre Forre maybe?

[LSdemocrat]

6. American society just isn't built to help people get daily exercise

The advantages of walking aren't available for most Americans. Outside of the Northeast and maybe one or two other cities local train service is not available. Grocery stores haven't been within walking distance for most people long before Wal-Mart and their ilk swept the land. Also that High Fructose Corn Syrup is legal to use in food is one of the main reasons that processed food is so unhealthy.

There are many problems that Wal-Mart has caused, I just don't think obesity is one of them.

[Yollam]

7. Such strange reactions...

I never said they were the sole cause.

But I do think they are a contributing factor.

[LSdemocrat]

10. Only in a very, very minor way compared to other societal factors

There's so much out there to scare people off of Walmart that there's no need to look for arguments that aren't that convincing.

[DoctorMyEyes]

11. Why are they "strange reactions"?

You had a thought, you shared it, and people who disagreed responded to it.

You don't have any facts to back up your premise - it's just "your feeling", right? Don't be so sensitive.

And before you ask, yes I have kids. They're all grown up now, but when I was raising THREE boys and working TWO jobs I didn't blame the stores for any poor choices I might have made.

Tonight for dinner I had a sandwich and pita chips. The sandwich was a yummy veggie patty , called a California Burger, topped with a thick slice of fresh tomato, a handful of bean sprouts, and a spooge of sour cream on a soft kaiser roll. It took less than two minutes to prepare and I got all the ingredients at Costco.

[Yollam]

12. Just the knee-jerk defensiveness of them.

In your case it's understandable - you have a HUUUGE conflict of interest since you work for them.

It's the same way with my brother, who is dead-set against single-payer health care and is a major apologist for the gouging by the health care insurance providers.

But it's only natural, since he is a well-paid administrator for a health care provider.


I suppose if liberals were drawing a bead on translation companies, I'd be a bit defensive too.


Kudos to you if you are able to juggle career and family so well. I don't find it easy at all.

[DoctorMyEyes]

15. I never claimed it was easy

Working and raising children is hard work. Hell, either one in itself takes a lot of time and energy.

I'd hardly say I have "HUUUGE conflict of interest" - I'm a freakin' cashier, not a major shareholder.

And I work at Costco because I respect Costco. Not the other way around. I used to sit on my ass at a bank, making more money than I do now. I quit because I didn't like the job. I didn't like what my job was about. So don't go making unfounded accusations about my integrity - unless making shit up to suit yourself is some kind of hobby you've taken up.

[Yollam]

16. I'm not "making shit up"

These are my thoughts and observations. You're free to disagree with them without calling them "bullshit".

And I'm aware that Costco is a much better corporate citizen than Wal-Mart/Sam's Club. If they would change their kooky policy of only taking American express cards, I might actually get a membership and go there now and then, but until they take Visa, I go to my neighborhood Smart & Final.

[DoctorMyEyes]

20. Go to Smart and Final then

Because we're not going to be inflating the price that everyone pays in order to cover the cost of your need to accrue debt. It'll be tough, but somehow we'll carry on without you.

[Yollam]

21. You take American Express's Blue card...

... which is a revolving account, so there's no need to get all high and mighty about it.

There are a lot of other people you end up carrying on without besides me....

[DoctorMyEyes]

23. Oh puhleeze!

You say that we're "ruining America", but you "might" sign up to shop with us if we'd take your visa card.

Why don't you just call it a night?


(BTW - it's not about the "revolving credit", it's about not raising the prices for EVERYONE ELSE in order to cover Visa/MC merchant processing fees.)

[Yollam]

26. See? Think a non-employee would get that riled about this?

So you're saying that Amex doesn't charge merchants any fees? If so, it's news to me.

I don't see why you're all in a huff. I'm simply telling why I don't do Costco. I have nothing especially against the company versus other big retailers. Another factor is the fact that Costco is on the other side of town and Smart & Final is 4 blocks away. The membership fee is also a bit of a hurdle for me too. $50 is a bit much for me all at once.

Take care there. It's good that you are protective of your company - they must treat there employees pretty decently for that to be the case. But mellow out, man, we're just talking.

[LSdemocrat]

19. The problem is that weak arguments are counter productive

The first rule of any battle/debate/campaign is to attack your opponent's weaknesses. If someone made a tour de force argument against Walmart and threw in "Walmart makes people fat", Walmart and the right-wing media would have a field day ridiculing that person and his/her credentials.

I hate Walmart and wish it would go away, but that doesn't mean we should use weaker arguments when we have so many that are so much stronger.

[regnaD kciN]

17. Not to mention...

a) the recognized phenomenon that more people work sedentary "desk jobs" than physical labor that would keep them in shape, combined with
b) the less-recognized phenomenon that, as work-hours go up and up, the sedentary nature of such work becomes more critical, espeically combined with
c) the destruction of the work-home proximity caused by the automobile-dominated culture of the past sixty years, particularly outside the Northeast.

It's one thing to work a desk job for eight hours a day, followed by a walk home. It's quite another to be at that desk job for ten, twelve, even fifteen hours a day, combined with an hour (or longer) commute each way through rush-hour traffic. At that rate, criticizing people for not eating a fresh, non-pre-packaged meal (and, of course, getting in an hour of exercise a day) seems patently silly.

[Telly Savalas]

33. That's a couple of other threads right there

Instilling sanity in urban design is something that should be a much higher priority for the progressive movement. Not only would it improve our nation's health, it would reduce our dependence on oil and make for overall improvements of our quality of life.

[DoctorMyEyes]

8. Yep - I had the name wrong.

It's Carrefour. And the first one opened in France in 1957. "Big Box" started as a European phenomenon.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrefour

[Conservativesux]

9. I hate Walmart, but nobody is forced to shop there and fork down chow. nt

[hollywood9]

13. Wilmart huh!

To me its a Repub thing to bitch about Walmart's.I've seen the.50 cent items in Walmarts going for 30,40.00 dollars in "small town specially stores"I grew up in a small town.Everyone that did not have a business was considered "lower-classed"than these mostly Republicans at this time in the 60's 70's and early eighties.Now in my mid 50's I can go back to this little town for holidays and visits and all those people that I watched sit mostly on their ass and pass the business that they inherited from their parents from the 40's and 50's on to their spoiled brats and I hear them now saying those damn Walmart's are running the country and at the same time these same people are supporting the Republician party that is fast taking their children's jobs and sending them overseas because of hugh tax incentives and slave labor rates that the "patriotic Repukes"voted for in the first place.Like all Repukes I ever knew,when it hits them in the pocketbook its immoral,unamerican and liberal bias.My two cents actual experience.How do these poor people making 5 and 6 dollars an hour working 2 or three jobs with no insurance supposed to make it buying at higher priced stores when they can barely buy auto gas and pay utilitie bills.You tell those people how sad Walmart is with its god forbid "lower prices".

[Yollam]

14. Talk about BS.

I would like to see which products go for 50 cents at Wal-mart and $40 at other shops. I don't buy that for a second.


On comparable products, Wally's prices are not even all that low, and most of what they sell is chintzy plastic junk that is not worth having anyway.

I make just over $25K per year and support a family of 4 living in a very expensive city, and I do NOT fin it necessary to go to wal-mart.

I get my groceries at the Chinese supermarket and the Smart & Final warehouse, and for housewares I go to Lowes or Target when the neighborhood ace hardware doesn't have what I need.

And I don't own a mom & pop, nor did my folks. I miss them, though.

By the way, please try using line breaks and punctuation. Reading that run-on paragraph was murder.

[hollywood9]

18. Lowes,Target and what other large chain store

In other words you go to the Walmart parking lot where 90% of all Lowes are located that sell at "low prices" that run small family owned lumber yards out of business and small family owned appliance business and small fencing business and ohhhhhhh,I think I see what you mean.By the way I'm loaded now $$$ even if the punctuation is not up to your "intelligent standards"run-on keeps on running and running and running ,boom,boom,boom.Talk about a common Bu-- Sh---er.

[Yollam]

22. As I said, I go to the chains only when I have to...

...and when I have to I go to the better ones. Lowes is a damn sight better than Home Depot, which gives heavily to the GOP and treats its employees like crap.

As for "lumber yards", I so seldom buy lumber it's a moot issue.

And my criticism of your run-on sentences isn't about being smart, it's about being legible, clear and easy to read. It is murder on the eyes trying to read through an endless sentence with no punctuation or returns. You want to continue being inconsiderate of the reader, fine. Your prerogative.

[hollywood9]

24. No pun intended

I only replied my opinion to your Walmart thingy.
All big chain business contributes heavily to the Republican party.Republicanism is big business interests and not the people interest period.Going to bed.Good night all.

[Yollam]

25. Sad but true.

I just looked up Lowes at buyblue.org, and they donated exclusively to the GOP. Home Depot made some donations to the dems but gave a HUGE amount to the GOP, so it's a tough choice - went with lowes because Home Depot's labor practices are so bad.

But there are a few blue-leaning companies - Starbucks and Ben & Jerry's. But I'm not really in the market for pricey gourmet coffee or ice cream...


Good night to you too.

[jmowreader]

28. Agree on the GOP contributions, don't agree on the employee treatment

The number of former Lowe's employees who now work at Home Depot (like the three working for me) because the company treats its associates better is quite high--in my store alone it's something like 15 percent of the whole staff.

Google "Chinese overtime" and "Lowe's class action lawsuit" sometime.

[Yollam]

30. I have a major problem with Home Depot's random drug test policy

I don't use drugs, but I have a major problem with employers being able to invade employees' privacy in ways the police even cannot. Unless a person is operating dangerous equipment like a forklift, there is no justification for giving them a drug test if they have given no outward indication of being intoxicated.

It's a personal pet peeve, and I'm aware that some people here won't agree, but I try not to patronize companies who treat their employees like criminals even when they have done nothing wrong.

[jmowreader]

31. Home Depot's drug test policy

Reasons we test people for drugs:

1. Pre-employment screening--if you want to wear the orange apron, you've got to fill the bottle first. This goes for everyone who wants to work for us--Bob Nardelli had to pee before he was hired, and he's the CEO--and all large retailers (and most smaller ones) do it now.

2. Reasonable-suspicion testing--if you act like you're drunk or high and you're on the clock, you're going to be taken for testing. (Semi-scary tale: we had to fire a guy last summer because we caught him smoking a joint while he was moving pallets of plants with a forklift.)

3. Post-accident testing--this is self-explanatory.

4. Pre-promotion testing--regular associate to department supervisor, department supervisor to assistant store manager, ASM to store manager, store manager to district manager, DM to regional manager...the only things past that are divisional vice president and CEO, and all the ones we have were hired from outside the company. Also, if you're being moved to a position that handles a very large sum of money, such as the store accounting desk, you'll be tested.

I have read the entire Home Depot drug test policy. It doesn't allow for random testing, it only allows for urine, blood or saliva testing (no hair testing) and it only allows management to test according to guidelines set down by Atlanta. They may at one time have allowed random testing, but it's not allowed anymore. OTOH, I can imagine that Wal-Mart allows it.

[Yollam]

32. Thanks for clarifying the policy.

I still find it objectionable, since Home Depot has no business testing for drugs that may have been ingested weeks before, IE THC. It is not their job to enforce the law.

I have no problem with reasonable suspicion testing or post-accident testing, however.


But it is better than random testing. Thanks for the info.

My employer has never tested me for drugs, nor have I ever given them reason to do so. I truly believe this is a much-better employee-employer relationship than one where the employee is put in a position off being under suspicion from the get-go, and where his inferior status to the corporation is made all too clear by the humiliation of having to provide the boss with a cup of pee.

I wonder if drugs could only be detected through examination of semen or menstrual samples, would people object to it then?

[jmowreader]

34. Now let me explain WHY the policy is as it is

It's because drugs are illegal.

This is a long-winded argument that could easily be stopped by legalizing cannabis and developing a non-chemical intoxication test.

I state "non-chemical" because pot is different from alcohol. We know that alcohol is water-soluble and cannabinoids are fat-soluble, which means that unlike the case with alcohol, your body will retain cannabinoids in detectable quantities far longer than it will retain them in intoxicating quantities. (I bet you guys who smoke weed would LOVE to smoke one joint and stay high for ten days. As expensive as that shit is anymore, it's important to get your money's worth.) Hence, if you piss hot you're stoned whether you really are--and thus the need for a non-chemical intoxication test. Does a person who's stoned have some kind of distinctively erratic pupillary response that a person who was stoned three days ago but isn't now doesn't have? Does a stoned person have some kind of muscle contraction in the forearm that a recently-stoned person doesn't? Is there SOMETHING that you do when you're stoned that you don't do when you're not that can be sensed by a machine? And can the machine be built cheaply enough that we can afford to put one in every police station, hospital emergency room and drug-testing center in America? With this device, all the objections to pot just fly out the window because alcohol is worse for you than pot in every way and we allow people to use that.

Now that we have that out of the way, let's look at my insurance carrier. They mandate all illegal drugs be treated the same. A joint is a pill is a line is a syringe. Very obviously, if the joint was no longer illegal, the syllogism collapses.

Think of some reasons why I may not wish to employ a Marijuana Smoker. Not "pot makes hair grow on the palms of your hands" but real reasons.

1. Safety considerations. Because of the test we have, which can detect THC consumption but not intoxication from THC consumption, if you drive your forklift through the door while it's down and you come up hot we have to assume you're stoned and that you WOULDN'T have driven through the door if you were not stoned. Mainly because you probably would have noticed the thirty gallons of hydraulic fluid you had to wade through to get on the machine in the first place. (Guess what runs the brakes and steering on a forklift?) If we can detect intoxication, pot becomes just like alcohol.

2. Blackmail considerations. Let's say you smoke dope. Let's say you're a cashier. Let's say I'm trying to rip your company off and I know you smoke dope. I go to you and tell you that if you won't ring expensive things up as cheap ones (there are many ways to do it even if you've got a completely-computerized Point of Sale system) I'll go to your manager and tell him you smoke dope with me every night. They piss you, you come up hot, you're out of a job, and there's nothing anyone can do to me. And it's not like you can go to your manager and explain what's happening...because, after all, you DO smoke dope. Once again, legalize weed and that issue vanishes.

3. Insurance considerations. My insurance company says a joint is a pill is a line is a needle. They're all illegal, so why not? If I want insurance coverage from anyone who will insure a large business, I've got to test for weed. We could self-insure, but it's more economically sound to buy insurance and piss test than it is to bury six months' corporate revenue in the back yard in case a customer twists her ankle because she went up one of our ladders that has "for associate use only" written on it when she was wearing stiletto heels...and got one stuck in the crusher mesh that is the stair tread.

4. Employee theft considerations. This happened to us: we had a guy working as a cashier who started smoking weed after he came on board. (You'd think the "do not clock in if you've used drugs recently" sign next to the time clock would dissuade these people. You think wrong.) He started skimming the till to pay for his pot because, while we do pay fairly well, the quality of the marijuana one can afford on a retail salary is not high. Marijuana is expensive largely because it is illegal. Legal marijuana would lead to affordable marijuana as free-market competition would drive prices down. And, of course, those with a green thumb could grow their own.

I'm certain there are other reasons why legalizing weed would solve half of America's problems (including the very obvious "if we let the potheads out of jail there'd be room enough for all the Republicans who need to be there"), but as I have to go to work now I'll wait till later.

[Yollam]

35. Well...

"Now let me explain WHY the policy is as it is - It's because drugs are illegal."


Last I checked, we had a police force to enforce the law. I don't see Home Depot checking whether their employees were frequenting prostitutes or staging cock fights.

And as for the safety arguments - I fully agree with a company's right to terminate an employee who is intoxicated on ANY substance, but in the case of marijuana, the substance is detectable for weeks after the intoxication has ended, which means the test does not detect intoxication and is not about safety. It's about imposing the employers' will on the employee, even into their off hours in the privacy of their own homes. It also requires a somewhat embarrassing test.

As for people who steal - there are people who are really into designer shoes that steal too. I seriously doubt that most potsmokers steal.

But I don't smoke pot. I don't steal. I've never had a DUI or a criminal record. I fail to see why I should be tested.

I agree with legalizing weed - it's quasi-legal here in CA already.

[Emit]

27. ABC's 20/20 did a special on a similar subject a few weeks ago

But more from the angle of whether the consumer really saves money and whether warehouse clubs encourage excess.

I know when I shop at Costco now, I have learned which items are really the good deals and which ones I can get cheaper elsewhere. Just because it comes in bulk sizes doesn't mean it's a good deal. And, I can judge more easily now how long perishable goods will last in our household. My family often splits packages with other friends or outside family members, so that we don't waste food.

Also, if we don't hide some of the goodies we've bought in bulk that come in great quantities, they do get eaten right away. That's why we've found it is best to repackage some of these items so that they are in smaller quantities, and store the rest in the back pantry for replenishing, to avoid that 'excess' thing this article/show was referring to.

As far as the poor choice of foods thing you mention, I think that is a personal choice. I have learned to avoid the packaged convenient foods, whether I'm in a regular grocery store or one of the warehouse type stores. I do know from talking with various nutritionists whom I worked with in helping Welfare recipients to transition to work (in daily living and budgeting classes) that many shoppers do get caught up in buying processed foods and convenient snack-type items because they perceive them to be cheaper, and easier to cook. It's not just the big warehouse style places that get consumers on this. Take a walk through any grocery store with a nutritionists, and they will always tell you to avoid the middle of the store. Stick to the parameters of the store, where the fresh foods and items are sold.

Anyway, just food for thought. :-)

Here's an excerpt:

http://www.abcnews.go.com/2020/Business/story?id=1323466

More people are buying in bulk at places called warehouse clubs. You have to pay to join. Is it worth it?

~snip~

The sheer volume of goods for sale, says Lempert, drives sales. "Because you look at the pallets and you go, wow, it must be cheap. I want to buy it." That's certainly true. At Costco, the vast aisles of merchandise made me feel compelled to shove things into my cart every time the crew wasn't taping me. One woman we spoke with said she had come to buy one thing — Hot Wings — but her car was already overflowing with snacks, salad dressing, a cooked chicken and a ham when we spoke to her.

~snip~

Researchers who study warehouse clubs also told us having all that food around the house makes people overeat.

Cornell University marketing professor Brian Wansink tracked the eating habits of 240 club shoppers for two weeks. He found most ate more, because they had more food in the house.

~snip~

Club shoppers said they were buying food for a month, but Wansink said within 10 days of buying it, people ate half the food that they had bought.

~snip~

Another problem, say the experts, is that club members often waste food bought in bulk, because it spoils or sits in the cabinet uneaten.

[ikojo]

29. People across the socio economic spectrum

are crushed for time.

The upper middle class are crushed because their kids are enrolled in too many after school activities, hoping they will get into Harvard or Yale.

The middle class and working class are crushed because of demands made on their time by kids and work (overtime and such).

[Deja Q]

36. So the populace hungers for processed chemicals, oh joy.