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Wal-Mart Tells Employees It Will Cut 11,200 Jobs -01.26.10 | New York Times

Wal-Mart Struggles to Expand in Chicago -01.22.10 | New York Times

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Fact Sheets

The Employee Free Choice Act Legislation that will truly make a difference for Wal-Mart workers

Wage & Hour Issues Read how Wal-Mart continually fails to pay every worker for every hour worked

Health Care Wal-Mart's still insures barely over half its employees on the company plan

Always Low Wages Poverty-level wages make life extremely difficult for Wal-Mart's 1.4 million workers

The Environment How Wal-Mart's business model is detrimental for our planet

Wal-Mart’s Negative Impact on Local Communities

Wal-Mart stores lower a community's median wages.

University of Pennsylvania, 2004 showed that poverty rates rise as WMT expands in counties across the country. Researchers found that Wal-Mart closes local businesses and effectively ruins community-based leadership.
UC Berkeley, 2007 found that new jobs at Wal-Mart stores almost inevitably come at the cost of other, better-paid jobs. New WMT stores drive down pay and benefits not only in retail, but in other similar sectors like grocery as well.
A 2006 Social Science Quarterly study found that nationwide an estimated 20,000 families have fallen below the official poverty line as a result of Wal-Mart’s expansion.

Wal-Mart Hurts Wages in the Southern United States. "Decreased wage levels are a big problem in the south, where Wal-Mart has a significant influence on local economies. Neumark found '…evidence of adverse effects of Wal-Mart stores on retail employment, total employment, and total payrolls per person in the South, where Wal-Mart stores are most numerous on a total and per capita basis, and where they have been open the longest.'" [The Effect of Wal-Mart on Local Labor Markets, BusinessWeek, 10/26/05]

Study Finds Wal-Mart Increases Efficiency, Has Low Prices and Causes Other Supermarkets to Lower Their Prices. Jerry Hausman, a professor of economics at M.I.T., concludes that "Wal-Mart is cutting wages, which is bad [for the economy], and is also more efficient, which is good. The question is: How much of each one?" Hausman also finds that Wal-Mart prices are very low and has even caused competitors to lower their prices. “…Wal-Mart's food prices are 27% lower than those of rivals on average and that its presence forces supermarkets to reduce their own prices by 5% more than they otherwise would have.” [Consumer Benefits from Increased Competition in Shopping Outlets: Measuring the Effect of Wal-Mart, BusinessWeek, 10/26/05]

Wal-Mart hurts local businesses.

Iowa State University and Mississippi State University professors found grocery stores in Mississippi saw sales decline anywhere from 10 to 20% when a Wal-Mart moved in: stores in multiple other categories saw sales declines as well.
University of California, 1999, studied grocery stores in California and found “The full economic impact of those lost wages and benefits throughout southern California could approach $2.8 billion per year.”
A 2005 report from the AFL-CIO finds that as Wal-Mart's increasing reliance on imported goods has meant fewer jobs in communities around the country.

Wal-Mart relies on state and local subsidies.

A 2007 report from Good Jobs First explains that Wal-Mart's "expansion has frequently been financed in part by taxpayers through economic development subsidies." The company relies on these subsidies to offset the costs of its expansion.
Michael Hicks, an economist at the Air Force Institute of Technology at the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio, submitted a study analyzing Wal-Mart employees and government health care programs. He concludes that Wal-Mart causes an increase in state Medicaid spending by as much as $898 per person. [Does Wal-Mart Cause an Increase in Anti-Poverty Program Expenditures?, BusinessWeek, 10/26/05]
The Wal-Mart Tax, a report from the AFL-CIO: "Wal-Mart’s refusal to pay decent wages and provide affordable health insurance to its workers puts it atop the list in at least 19 of the 23 states
surveyed here. This abuse of poverty health care programs means Wal-Mart is directly contributing to the nation’s Medicaid crisis."
See also: Wal-Mart's Watch's report, Wal-Mart's Tax Avoidance Schemes: How Wal-Mart’s Pursuit of Lower Taxes Has Cost States and Their Communities Millions.

Wal-Mart costs taxpayers money.

In 2007, a Wall Street Journal story exposed Wal-Mart's questionable practice of exploiting tax loopholes to dodge property taxes in several states.
An AFL-CIO 2006 report shows Wal-Mart consistently tops state Medicaid rosters, as the company’s health plan remains inaccessible to thousands of its employees.
A Good Jobs First report showed that Wal-Mart consistently appeals property tax assessments.