Sunday, November 20, 2005

Wal-Mart the Movie: Redux

We screened the flick at one of my union's offices on Friday night. About 20 or so mostly older (than me at least) people came.

The film itself was pretty good, but I think that they left out an important part of the picture, which is the way Wal-Mart squeezes its suppliers (the folks who manufacture the shit Wal-Mart sells) to keep their prices down. This in turn insures that the suppliers keep their wage and benefits packages low so they can match Wal-Mart's prices.

It also didn't focus on Wal-Mart's anti-union practices in Texas and in Quebec. When 11 meat cutters voted to join a union, Wal-Mart quit cutting meat in all of its national stores in response. When Quebecois Wal-Mart workers voted to affiliate with a union last year (this time the entire store) Wal-Mart simply shut the store down.

Still, these are minor quibbles. The film effectively focused on telling the individual stories of workers, small business owners, and the communities affected by the Beast from Bentonville.

I think that the folks who came got something out of it, and it was exciting to see lots of people that I didn't know.

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