To put the scale of the subsidy in rough proportion, about 25% of welfare handouts are spent at Walmart.
Entitlements (all in) are 50% of the budget.
Counting wage subsidies and Medicaid, something approaching $0.12 of every tax dollar collected go to Walmart.
That math is very inaccurate, in that there are lots of other entitlements (section 8 housing, etc) but I don’t have time to limit to snap and Walmart employees, but it’s big enough to be a full percentage,
It’s easily the biggest indirect beneficiary of taxpayer largess in the world.
Now, Walmart is not alone. The entire food ecosystem is subsidized this way.
So it is unfair to pick on just Walmart.
All of the entitlements need to go.
Wal-Mart’s operating profit margin is around 4%.
Without subsidized employees, it would go broke (unless it could raise its prices).