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posted by Fnord666 on Thursday January 11 2018, @10:11PM   Printer-friendly
from the what's-the-catch dept.

Walmart is boosting minimum pay across all of its stores and handing out bonuses. The CEO says that it's thanks to tax reform:

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is boosting its starting hourly wage to $11 and delivering bonuses to employees, capitalizing on the U.S. tax overhaul to stay competitive in a tightening labor market.

The increase takes effect next month and will cost $300 million on top of wage hikes that were already planned, the world's largest retailer said Thursday. The one-time bonus of up to $1,000 is based on seniority and will amount to an additional $400 million. The company is also expanding its maternity and parental leave policy and adding an adoption benefit.

"Tax reform gives us the opportunity to be more competitive globally and to accelerate plans for the U.S.," Chief Executive Officer Doug McMillon said in the statement.

The move comes three years after Wal-Mart last announced it was raising wages, spending $1 billion in 2015 to lift starting hourly pay to $9 and then to $10 for most workers the following year. The increase cut into profit and was criticized by some longer-tenured employees as unfair to them. Since then, many states have enacted minimum wage laws, meaning that a "sizable group" of its 4,700 U.S. stores already pay $11 an hour, according to spokesman Kory Lundberg.

Walmart is expanding a "Scan & Go" program from 50 to 150 stores. "Scan & Go" would allow customers to use a smartphone app to scan items and then walk out of the store with them. Kroger is experimenting with a similar "Scan, Bag, Go" program. These are seen as a response to Amazon, which has been trialing delivery of fresh foods and same-day deliveries. Amazon revealed an "Amazon Go" concept brick-and-mortar store in 2016, with no cashiers in sight.

Maybe Walmart's big plan is to give better pay to a dwindling amount of employees.

CEO letter to employees. Also at CNBC and USA Today.

Related: Walmart Wants to Deliver Groceries Directly Into Your Fridge
Walmart to Deploy Shelf-Scanning Robots at 50 Stores
Walmart is Raising Prices Online to Increase in-Store Traffic


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  • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday January 12 2018, @11:46PM (24 children)

    by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Friday January 12 2018, @11:46PM (#621613) Homepage Journal

    Forcing? Sorry, you don't get to blame the results of your own poor foresight on anyone else. Nobody forced you to make the choices you made.

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  • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday January 13 2018, @03:19AM (23 children)

    by JoeMerchant (3937) on Saturday January 13 2018, @03:19AM (#621668)

    Troll much? The only way you could actually believe your own bullshit is if you live under a rock, alone.

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    • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday January 13 2018, @03:30AM (22 children)

      by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Saturday January 13 2018, @03:30AM (#621674) Homepage Journal

      Or I could just believe in personal responsibility instead of blaming all your woes on others.

      --
      My rights don't end where your fear begins.
      • (Score: 3, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Saturday January 13 2018, @06:07AM (21 children)

        by JoeMerchant (3937) on Saturday January 13 2018, @06:07AM (#621712)

        Nope, not buying it, unless you're like 12 years old you should know that there's as much luck in life, things beyond an individual's control, as there is making personally responsible choices.

        Fish in the ocean live and die by luck more than skill, strength or "responsible choices." Part of human society, for millennia, has involved a level of mercy and care for those less fortunate. Misfortune can strike anyone, regardless of their level of personal responsibility, morality, diligence, industry, or intelligence. The vast majority need help now and again, and the vast majority don't have rich relatives who will just make everything alright by writing a check.

        If you're going to cram people into cities and make them all interdependent on each other, you can either provide social safety nets, or just let the sick, dead and desperate clog your streets. There's not enough productive land on the planet for everyone to have an independent homestead where we either make a living off of our own land or starve when winter comes.

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        • (Score: 1, Flamebait) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday January 13 2018, @11:33AM (20 children)

          by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Saturday January 13 2018, @11:33AM (#621759) Homepage Journal

          ...luck in life, things beyond an individual's control...

          This is what losers blame all their failures on, yes. Men, however, prefer to take responsibility for the courses our lives take. This includes planning ahead for unfortunate circumstances.

          --
          My rights don't end where your fear begins.
          • (Score: 4, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Saturday January 13 2018, @02:41PM (19 children)

            by JoeMerchant (3937) on Saturday January 13 2018, @02:41PM (#621804)

            This is what losers blame all their failures on, yes. Men, however, prefer to take responsibility for the courses our lives take. This includes planning ahead for unfortunate circumstances.

            The problem with the great roulette wheel of populist capitalism is that, in a society of 350 million, it still puts thousands of people who made all the best, most responsible choices possible in their life, even planning ahead with all possible foresight, jobless and homeless. And, of course, we're talking about human beings here, so many more make less than optimal choices too.

            What percentage of the population are you willing to brand "losers" and let twist in the wind? When one of those "losers" kills your parents in an alley, are you going to go vigilante and run around in a bat suit at night futilely attempting to take responsibility for your family being insensitive, sociopathic jerks? Very few people start from such a fortunate position in life as to be able to do that. Personally, I'd rather shape society such that the "losers" don't have strong biologically based reasons to go around killing people in dark alleys for a couple of bucks, 'cause even the "best families" can get unlucky that way too.

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            • (Score: 2, Disagree) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday January 13 2018, @04:38PM (18 children)

              by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Saturday January 13 2018, @04:38PM (#621840) Homepage Journal

              Yes, I'm sure you would enjoy it if wild unicorns just ran around and shit piles of money in everyone's yard every morning. Unfortunately that isn't going to happen. In this life you can either earn your way or you can steal from others. One of these is a morally correct choice and benefits society as a whole while the other is contemptible and society is better off paying to incarcerate you. No, it does not matter if you talk the government into doing the stealing for you; adding a middle-man does not change the ethical correctness of an act.

              --
              My rights don't end where your fear begins.
              • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday January 13 2018, @05:15PM (4 children)

                by JoeMerchant (3937) on Saturday January 13 2018, @05:15PM (#621855)

                society is better off paying to incarcerate you.

                Wow! Three hots and a cot in a warm, dry room? Sounds like a great deal, if you happen to get caught. And who pays for the guards, and the chase, and the trial, and the incarceration? That sounds like a lot of expense to me, just to reward thieves with a comfy place to live after they get caught.

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                • (Score: 1, Flamebait) by Azuma Hazuki on Monday January 15 2018, @03:27AM (3 children)

                  by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Monday January 15 2018, @03:27AM (#622399) Journal

                  When people show you who they are, believe them the first time, okay? Uzzard is not worth your debate time or your bandwidth. He's not here for honest debate. You've seen this. He's PROUD of that sociopathic horseshit he spent half a dozen posts spewing.

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                  I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
                  • (Score: 2, Flamebait) by JoeMerchant on Monday January 15 2018, @03:57AM (2 children)

                    by JoeMerchant (3937) on Monday January 15 2018, @03:57AM (#622416)

                    Khallow at least tries to have some internal consistency and supportable logic for his bent view of the universe. I don't usually tangle with Uzzard, but he's much easier to push into an irrational corner, it's nice to see that his surface BS comments are backed up by deeper, even less supportable BS. And, besides, I was bored.

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                    • (Score: 2, Informative) by Azuma Hazuki on Monday January 15 2018, @06:28AM (1 child)

                      by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Monday January 15 2018, @06:28AM (#622460) Journal

                      Gods, we have some complete pieces of shit on this forum, don't we? All I hope for is every single one of the ones like Uzzard ends up sick and homeless through no fault of their own and has their "come to Jesus" moment. Whether they survive it or not. Nothing teaches people like them except personal suffering.

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                      I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
                      • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday January 15 2018, @01:48PM

                        by JoeMerchant (3937) on Monday January 15 2018, @01:48PM (#622562)

                        I have some older relatives who would "never take charity from anyone," but... that didn't stop them from taking their $1000 per month social security checks from a system they never paid into (because they were self-employed and not forced to...) Still, they didn't sign up for SNAP, which they could have been eligible for, because that would have been a government handout.

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              • (Score: 2) by acid andy on Monday January 15 2018, @10:14AM (12 children)

                by acid andy (1683) on Monday January 15 2018, @10:14AM (#622512) Homepage Journal

                Most forms of commerce in the modern day free market are a type of stealing. Stealing with consent, really. There are a few products and services that are truly good value for money. The rest, by maximizing profit and minimizing costs, are effectively scams to trick people into parting with wealth that they arguably would have been better off keeping, once their crappy product breaks in a few months or their service backfires. Quality and durability of products is cut to a bare minimum and marketing spins illusions to sell shit that people simply do not need. Many services people would be far better off in the long term if they simply learned to do it themselves.

                The bigger the world population, the more competitive people have to get to stake a claim to decent land and resources so rather than a constructive force, work becomes a battle to see whoever can screw over the other guy quickest and take their wealth from them.

                It's a race to the bottom.

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                If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
                • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday January 15 2018, @10:38AM (11 children)

                  by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Monday January 15 2018, @10:38AM (#622517) Homepage Journal

                  Stealing with consent is what we sane people like to call "voluntary exchange".

                  --
                  My rights don't end where your fear begins.
                  • (Score: 2) by acid andy on Monday January 15 2018, @10:49AM (10 children)

                    by acid andy (1683) on Monday January 15 2018, @10:49AM (#622521) Homepage Journal

                    When people's wages are so far behind inflation that they can only afford the cheapest, crappiest food that has been incrementally reduced in size and quality it's barely voluntary. When all affordable choices for a product have crappy built in obsolescence and don't work as advertised, value is being stolen from the consumer because they're being tricked into paying for an imagined benefit that simply doesn't exist in what they are getting.

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                    If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
                    • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday January 15 2018, @12:55PM (9 children)

                      by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Monday January 15 2018, @12:55PM (#622546) Homepage Journal

                      Yeah, that's 100% voluntary exchange. Those in that situation are contributing fuck-all, so they're making fuck-all. Which they should. If your value in your job is no better than that of some dipshit kid just entering the workforce, you absolutely deserve to be paid the same shitty wages. If you think you're more valuable but nobody will pay you more, you're simply incorrect.

                      As for shitty products, that corrects itself barring monopoly powers or regulatory capture; just not instantly.

                      --
                      My rights don't end where your fear begins.
                      • (Score: 2) by acid andy on Monday January 15 2018, @02:43PM (8 children)

                        by acid andy (1683) on Monday January 15 2018, @02:43PM (#622574) Homepage Journal

                        Yeah, that's 100% voluntary exchange. Those in that situation are contributing fuck-all, so they're making fuck-all. Which they should. If your value in your job is no better than that of some dipshit kid just entering the workforce, you absolutely deserve to be paid the same shitty wages. If you think you're more valuable but nobody will pay you more, you're simply incorrect.

                        Of course there's some link between a wage and the value to the employer. Or at least a theoretical upper limit to that wage. However it's widely recognized that generally speaking, if you're not someone like a director or investment banker, wages in the western world have been stagnating for years. That doesn't mean that the work being done has become less valuable over time. Wages for the same work (or in many cases, an expanded work load) have fallen in real terms, year after year, for the overwhelming majority of people. So are you saying that the vast, overwhelming majority of people are dipshits, oh mighty feathered scaly footed one? If so, I suppose it's possible you may be onto something but I think the mob may beg to differ when they arrive with their pitchforks.

                        As for shitty products, that corrects itself barring monopoly powers or regulatory capture; just not instantly.

                        Well it best get a move on. I've seen a gradual decline in the durability of most products over the last 20 years. The old "They don't make them like they used to!" meme was definitely on to something!

                        --
                        If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
                        • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday January 15 2018, @03:52PM (7 children)

                          by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Monday January 15 2018, @03:52PM (#622586) Homepage Journal

                          I'm saying their work is less valuable to their employer if the average wage for their position is falling, yes. Look, wages aren't ideally valued correctly, they're always valued correctly. If you accept less, it's because you don't believe you can go out and find better. Which means that nobody is willing to pay you more. Which means the market has correctly valued your industriousness.

                          The solution to having a shitty paying job is either A) go get the same job for more elsewhere or B) go get a different job that pays better. Wanting or needing more money does not entitle you to more money. Need and desire are not valuable characteristics.

                          I've seen a gradual decline in the durability of most products over the last 20 years.

                          That there is what them of us with a wee bit of vision like to call an "opportunity". Toyota understands that, which is why their vehicles could be expected to run over a quarter of a million miles since the 90s. Mind you, it has to be done in an area where people have a significant amount of give-a-shit about the durability to price ratio for the item in question.

                          --
                          My rights don't end where your fear begins.
                          • (Score: 2) by acid andy on Monday January 15 2018, @04:30PM (6 children)

                            by acid andy (1683) on Monday January 15 2018, @04:30PM (#622606) Homepage Journal

                            Look, wages aren't ideally valued correctly, they're always valued correctly. If you accept less, it's because you don't believe you can go out and find better.

                            If as the statistics seem to suggest, most wages are stagnating, that implies that in most cases there simply isn't anything better out there. What you're saying seems to suggest that people in such situations should seek a promotion or acquire new skills for a higher paid job. The trouble is, there are far fewer of the higher paid positions available than lower paid. That's why, on average, people are screwed.

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                            If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
                            • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday January 15 2018, @04:34PM (5 children)

                              by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Monday January 15 2018, @04:34PM (#622608) Homepage Journal

                              Only if you come at it from a "Average people are incapable of creating jobs, only of performing them" point of view. Which is quite shitty to average people and also untrue.

                              --
                              My rights don't end where your fear begins.
                              • (Score: 2) by acid andy on Monday January 15 2018, @04:44PM (4 children)

                                by acid andy (1683) on Monday January 15 2018, @04:44PM (#622610) Homepage Journal

                                Yeah, I did think of the "create your own job" option for people and it's certainly still very possible for many people. It's a fair point. Of course it's harder than it used to be in the west due to globalization (which can bring advantages but brings increased competition), monopolies, increased regulation and of course the widening wealth inequality meaning less consumers are available to afford a high price for your product.

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                                If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
                                • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday January 15 2018, @05:03PM (3 children)

                                  by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Monday January 15 2018, @05:03PM (#622616) Homepage Journal

                                  It's mostly harder because people have been conditioned to not think for themselves.

                                  Drop the wealth inequality line entirely though. The only people wealth inequality is a bad thing to are those whose personal happiness is rooted in greed. Having a large spread between the super wealthy and Average Joe does zilch to consumer prices. The only prices it has an effect on are things that are only marketed to the uber-wealthy; like gold-plated swimming pools.

                                  --
                                  My rights don't end where your fear begins.
                                  • (Score: 2) by acid andy on Monday January 15 2018, @05:21PM (2 children)

                                    by acid andy (1683) on Monday January 15 2018, @05:21PM (#622625) Homepage Journal

                                    I think easy credit for the Average Joe masked the true long term effects on prices.

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                                    If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
                                    • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday January 15 2018, @07:24PM (1 child)

                                      by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Monday January 15 2018, @07:24PM (#622672) Homepage Journal

                                      Oh it fucked up a hell of a lot of things. Credit cards should only ever be used to build your credit score; put normal expenses on them and pay them off in full at the end of the month. Average people using them any other way is fucking retarded.

                                      --
                                      My rights don't end where your fear begins.
                                      • (Score: 2) by acid andy on Monday January 15 2018, @07:48PM

                                        by acid andy (1683) on Monday January 15 2018, @07:48PM (#622688) Homepage Journal

                                        Although I would have worded it more charitably, you've found something we can agree on.

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                                        If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?