Quote:
Originally Posted by bronco67
But you also probably know that if every WalMart employee got a 20% bump in salary, the owners of the company would be only marginally less rich. I'm not a major employer -- I'm a one man business, but there's a concept I definitely understand -- or maybe its more of a philosophy.
If you make your employees happy by giving them a wage that's livable in an economy where the cost of everything is rising, then they'll be happy to show up for work and do their best job to make your company thrive -- which means long term riches.
No one is going to profit in the long run if the people who work for them aren't satisfied with the pay their getting. Of course, there are limits that need to be set -- but those rich bastards at Walmart are pretty cheap. Like I said before, it's great that they built something and got rich from it, but at least have the attitude of taking care of the people who helped get you there -- instead of having employee based food drives.
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In theory giving the Walmart employees an extra bump will make them happy...for about 3 weeks. Raises and bonuses don't have much of a long term effect. People that are prone to living week to week quickly find something new to waste that raise on and in a very short time it's business as usual. Push it to far, the company has no alternative but to raise prices.
Don't forget about those shareholders. That's the key part of this situation. 401k's are built on dividends. Growth in every facet of the economy depends of keeping those shareholders enthusiastic.
My own opinion is Walmart and McDonalds should raise their prices. However, if they do that a lot of customers will be unhappy. McDonalds isn't like Exxon. People don't require cheeseburgers and fries. And look at how much we all love Exxon & BP..
edit:check your math on that 20%. If Walmart eliminated all of the owners bonuses it wouldn't add up to anywhere near a 20% pay increase for the employee base. The only way for that to happen is to raise consumer prices.