Lee Scott To Take Monthlong Vacation

Lee Scott is going fishing because he is on a tight budget!!!
Maybe he can travel to China and bunk for a few days with the 20 cent an hour workers after their 10 hour days just for fun.

Actually JM? It sounds like he’s trying to lay low for awhile. ROFL.

How else could one explain it? Walmart’s under fire from all sides, and Lee decides on a long vacation - as if he’s trying to hide from reporters & pissed off citizens or something.

How does this article pertain to helping out WM employees?

Come on, be nice to him.  Screwing over employees and making crappy decisions is hard work!

Come on, guys...This whole line of attack is stupid.  This site and Wake Up Wal-Mart are trying to spin Lee Scott’s vacation into something that’s bad.

Lee’s opting to take a month off because it’s his right to do this.  So what if it’s a rare thing for a CEO to take a month off?  Sam Walton used to do that as well.

You folks that are being critical of this really ought to be ashamed!  Lee’s been with Wal-Mart since at least 1979, so, according to policy, he’s entitled to take that much time off if he wants to.  Let the man have his R&R;time as he’s earned a break.

Can anyone here truly say that they could run Wal-Mart, GM or any major company perfectly?  I sure can’t.  Yes, I do agree that there are things that the company is doing that’s just plain wrong and/or stupid, but, I will not cross the line in attacking a top exec for taking a month off for a vacation.  I do agree that the company used some heavy-handed tactics at times that I question the timing of.

Lee does not need people and the critics slamming this decision to have time off as this is not even related to business...it’s a personal decision of his and even if we hate it, we need to respect that it’s his right...a God-Given Right for him to take off for a month.  He’s tired of the constant attacks on the company from critics and unions that are ticked that Wal-Mart is not catering to their demands or are more union-friendly.

OK...Wal-Mart’s got a huge target on their collective backsides because the company is still the #1 retailer/discount chain in the country.  We can question their business ethics all we want, that is our right to do so, but, let’s not cross the line here and criticize Lee Scott for wantint to have some time to himself without worrying so much about what the enemies of the company are saying.  Put yourself in his shoes for a bit…

You run a major retailer that is getting slammed at all sides by people and unions that want tnothing more than to see WM go the way of the dodo.  You’re tired of hearing the same crap over and over how the company craps on people in other countries and even at home.  You realize that even when the critics are right, fixing the problem is going to take a lot longer than a Saturday morning meeting or a board meeting or two.

And, you realize that you are beginning to burn out and that shows in some comments made in a few opinions posted for Associates to read.  Someone suggests that maybe you need to take a step back for a while and just go have some fun, and, you take that advice to heart and schedule a long vacation.

Suddenly, when you announce that you’re taking a month of PERSONAL TIME, your union critics criticze you for even that.

My response would be, “Eat my shorts!” followed by two upraised middle fingers.

Yeah, part of me feels bad for him as a human being (a foreign concept to a lot of people) and another part of me doesn’t because I tend to strongly believe that he doesn’t give a DAMN about Wal-Mart employees.

i never got a vacation because of the hours i worked and never and the last bonus was2 christmases agond i had been there 14yrs i quit the first week march never been happier life is great

Wonder needs to read the paper more. There has been so much corporate dishonesty in the last few years that one can’t miss it. Enron Worldcom Holindger, just to name a few.

JM, you and your belief that WM should pay more are ridiculous!!!

Just exactly how would WM accomplish paying more?  How do you justify to shareholders that the largest corporate expense is going to go up 5%??  Really, how do you justify it?  I eagerly await your reply so that I can get a better understanding of your “business sense.”

Michael,

I’m a shareholder in WMT stock and also an associate in one of the stores.  The company would not have to justify a 5% increase in pay across the board for associates because while prices would nudge up a little bit more, I feel that associates need to compensated even that amount more.

Being an associate is not easy!  WHoever said it was, is fooling themselves.  Associates daily have to deal with customers that might get irate for little reason, or are already ticked at something else and the associate is a target of opportunity.

It doesn’t help that the store management might be a tad more hostile than needed.  That’s one thing that the Home Office should be taking a real close look at, to be honest, and one thing that the critics tend to be nailing pretty well.  Luckily for me, the managers at the store I work at are more of what I would love to see in other stores.

5% is nothing compared to the cost of moving goods from suppliers, to the Distro Centers to the individual stores.  How much has transportation costs gone up in the last two years or so when oil prices were $25-$30 a barrel compared to $63-$67 now?  In 2000, IIRC, diesal prices were far below the retail price for regular gas.

OK..you’re wondering, “What does this have do do with associate wages?” If stockholders have to swallow what amounts to double or sometimes triple the cost of getting goods to the Wal-Mart or Sam’s Club and ultimately into customer’s hands and still trying to keep the “Everyday Low Prices” a reality.

I know that there’s a lot of other factors involved here that critics might have valid points on.  But, the highest costs right now is actually the transportation cost. I think.

Stockholders are very worried about the large amount of lawsuits that the company is facing here in the USA and that’s keeping stock prices somewhat depressed.  Heck...the stock went up almost three dollars in three business days and has already shed most of that gain right back.  I’m barely breaking even, now, because of the “correction”.  I’d love to see the company belly-up to the bar and settle out of court, but, that’s not going to happen.  If the lawsuits are able to be settled in a sway that everyone walks away happy and business practices change at the Home Office, I think that after a dip in stock prices, the stock might recover nicely enough that a smart investor rides out the storm.

Bottom line:  stockholders would not object to a modest across the board raise for associates.

Water only flows into rivers.  [Tahiti proverb]
(Money goes only to the wealthy)

Michael D., the fact that Lee Scott makes what he makes is ridiculous.  The amount of money wasted on turnover and PR is ridiculous.  The sickening greed of the Walton family is ridiculous.  The idea that Wal-Mart just possibly can’t afford to pay better is ridiculous.  What if someone said that what YOU do at the company doesn’t deserve any money?  Would your attitude be different then?  By the way, I don’t recall if you ever mentioned (or maybe I missed it) if you were a store, assistant, floor, or department manager.  If you don’t mind, I’m curious to know.

I would ask the Wal-Mart why the worlds largest corporation can justify their workers who are moms and dads, and their children a standard of living well below the American dream?

On just about every one of these threads someone will state that Wal-Mart pays below “the standard of living”.  One person’s standard of living is another person’s poverty level is another person’s utopia.  I have yet to see anyone tell us what that standard of living is. Anything you come up with will probably be okay for some segment of society and not for another.  It will never be fair and equal.  Someone will always cry foul and say they are being unfairly treated. 

Here is the 2005 Poverty Guide:

Persons in Family Unit 48 Contiguous States (not including AK and HI)

1 $ 9,570
2 12,830
3 16,090
4 19,350
5 22,610
6 25,870
7 29,130
8 32,390
For each additional person, add $3,260

The average pay at Wal-Mart is said to be around $9.68 an hour.  That equates to $20,134 for a full time employee and $14,094 for a person working 28 hours a week or part time.  So, even a single person with one dependent working part time would be above the Federal Government’s Poverty level.  Now, in a two-income scenario where one person is working full time and the other part time they would make ($20,134 + $14,094) $34,228.  Now they’re making twice the poverty level for a family of three.  And if it’s only two persons (no children) then they’re making almost 3x the poverty level.
I will go on record as saying these wages are still low in the grand scheme of living, but I also don’t think you can continue to blame a corporation (any corporation) for the low wages in America today.  Wages haven’t increased with inflation over the past 25 years in most sectors of society Even if Wal-Mart used 1/2 of its annual profits (approx $5B, would raise the average wage approx $2.5 an hour or $5,200 per year for a full time employee) they would then try and recover that money somewhere else, i.e., reduced hours for everyone, less employees, less vendors, reduced transportation costs, etc., etc., etc.  All this would have an overall impact of more people out of work, some employees making less because of reduced hours, etc.  At the same time everyone wants Wal-Mart to pony up more money for Health Care.  Where does that come from?  Since they just ate a $5B loss in profits for employee pay, they’ll need employee’s to cover more of their own health care costs.  That cuts into the employee’s extra money. 
It’s a viscious cycle that I can’t help but think can’t be fixed anytime soon.
Please weigh in with comments about the above, but keep the mudslinging and name calling to yourselves.

Well, Rob, if that’s what the government claims poverty is, then it must be true.  It is a vicious cycle, but it would be a lot easier to start fixing then a lot of people realize.

Generic-

I know! The evil rich people running the government certainly can’t be trusted to calculate how much money it takes to survive. Those poverty guidelines are useless. We should just ask people how much money they think they need to live and assign that as their compensation no matter what job they do. That way no one can complain that they don’t get a “living wage.”

Lets start from the top. The Walton family, then Lee Scott and the executives. Are they being compensated enough?
I’ll bet they think not.

Water only flows into rivers.  [Tahiti proverb]
(Money goes only to the wealthy)

A couple of observations:
1.  I retired as an officer of WMT in the late 90’s.
2.  I was there when Sam was alive.
3.  Sam did not take month long vacations that I saw.
4.  To earn a vacation you should do your job.
5.  The CEO’s job is to create shareholder value and lead.
6.  What has the stock done since H. Lee became CEO.
7.  Not for sure it should be a vacation or a decision month.

RETIRED GUY

Is it true that Mr. Sam never tipped his barber for a haircut?

Gupta,
I don’t know.  I’ll ask Gene when I’m in his barbershop in a couple of weeks.  He keeps photos of Sam and Bud hanging in his barber shop to this day.