Replies

Gonna be long-winded (sorry) to the three who commented, in an attempt to get my point across.

Early in my single working years I was pretty shiftless and found my niche as a tramp printer, bouncing all over the country and working mostly on country weeklies out in the boonies. If I didn’t like a situation, I bailed. Always had a job if I was willing to move. In later years I was a contract programmer and was insulated from the usual crap management laid on their permanent employees. Maybe that’s why my W-M experience was a dash of cold water in the face when I got reintroduced to that game.

I was retired for 10 years when I started working for beer money at W-M, immediately noticed management’s attitude when it came to handling unskilled people, and saw the same Bottom-Line-Is-God and Take-It-Or-Leave-It attitude carried to extremes. I could take a more ambivalent view of what went on as I could always quit, and eventually did, not over their policies, but due to an interest in another area. Funny thing, management tried to talk me out of it. (See post #459)

OK, I understand, business is not a charity and you are owed nothing. The store I worked at was in a basically one-industry town (Casino - not Vegas). EVERYBODY was cutting back and jobs are non-existent, period, even five years later. IMO, management saw that and went beyond the expected tight-ship approach. From what others tell me, it’s like that all over Nevada.

More than once when people complained to me, I at first told them the same thing - “go elsewhere”. Many times they couldn’t - medical condition of their spouse or family member, underwater house, etc. Stuff I thought was not a wimp-out. Supervisors soon found the weak ones and would go out of their way to jerk them around with constant threats of termination, take-it-or-leave-it abrupt shift or hour changes or just a plain nasty overbearing attitude - always with the “Lotta people want your job.” mantra that you see here on this board. That’s exactly what I heard from those who went through the ‘29 Depression.

“Walmart employees should be willing to give it their all or quit.”
That goes for any company. However, after 60 years in the work force I have repeatedly seen employees give it their all and get kicked in the teeth for it as soon as management saw that they could save a buck by doing so. It’s much worse today and management has slipped back into their 1930s mindset - not just because business it tight (understandably), but because they CAN.

>[people trapped] “Not so much. Most folks can find work elsewhere, just not as good.”
Small comfort. Go from being trapped in one crappy job to being trapped in a lower-paying crappy job. My point is, in my area, there aren’t even crappy jobs, and it’s from that viewpoint that I’m talking about. There’s plenty of other small towns like that throughout America.

>Many were “trapped” prior to the advent of unions.
Trapped doesn’t need quotes - I’ve seen too many valid instances. I wasn’t making an argument for or against unions, so I don’t know what you’re getting at.
>Are you advocating something that inquiring minds desire to know?
Again, dunno what you’re getting at. I was just commenting about the Dickensian mindset many businesses have returned to when they didn’t need to.
> Do you restrict your purchase of union only or non-union establishments?
That’s foolish. I really don’t care one way or the other. In this case, I don’t patronize THAT particular store because I saw how they treated their people. Other stores perhaps have more enlightened (i.e. competent) management.