roachboy

so let's see where things now stand.

you, ace, appear to be so constituted that you cannot take seriously any objections to walmart's labor practices, or to the problematic labor practices that are the direct result of walmart's pricing policies.
you exclude working people from your arguments about low prices, which you seem to see as the outcome of the play of abstract forces.

beneath this there seems to be an outmoded friedmanite view of things according to which only capital creates wealth--the only interests a firm is obligated to take into account are those of the shareholders--you have not caught up with the notion of stakeholder, presumably because that would involve you in a way of thinking about capitalist activity as a social activity and not as something restricted to a special area of human activity we call the economy, which somehow floats above the rest of social lofe, subject to its own laws, etc.

when walmart's predatory location practices are singled out, you counter with the assumption that such practices are a natural extension of capitalist activity and that coexistence of different types of distribution systems (which would result in a diversity of types of market activity) presupposes price collusion.
i dont follow this line of thinking at all.
what you seem to me to be doing is repeating the logic of capitalism as war that is at the root of many of the dysfunctions the system generates for everyone.
one reason that so many tncs--with the exception of flinstone outfits like walmart--have abandoned such logic is that it is, in the end, self-defeating. bad for business. good for ideologues, perhaps, but bad for actual business IF anything beyond short-term profits are relevant.

the idea that it even makes sense for a firm like walmart to target other types of distribution systems and run them out of business has nothing really to do with the kind of competition you seem to value: it has more to do with the logic of concentration than with that of competition. you say you value competition, but your refusal to differentiate between types of competition indicates that you have no real problem with concentration, even if it comes at the expense of quality of life--particularly not if the quality of life most heavily and adversely impacted is that of working people.



but shareholder interest is not the only relevant interest.
but that of course is a function of other considerations.
if you like capitalism as a social system, you should also be inclined to consider long-term interests.
erasing all but shareholder interests is a sure way to implode the system you cheerlead for.
the primary reason why shareholder theory has been abandoned in favor of stakeholder theory is simply that shareholder theory is only functional in contexts where short term economic thinking can be hegemonic. in teh real world, where you have to look at forces not registered on the stock exchange in addition to financial performance, shareholder theory has been proven to be self-defeating.
most international economic institutions understand this.
most governments understand this.
most auditing firms understand
most ngos understand.
nike understands; adidas understands; royal dutch shell understands; most automobile manufacturers understand; in fact, most mncs and tncs understand--but you do not.
there is a real gap between how the vast majority of tncs and mncs operate and how walmart operates--you dont seem to get that.
walmart is a kind of pathological anomaly

oh yeah--well, i am sure that these folk are delighted...i wonder how manyof them actually are discrete individuals and how many of these individuals retain control over their products?

now you are dreaming, ace. walmart's suoply chain comes with very heavy prices to be paid: no space for anoever on the part of suppliers--the only increase in profits they will get comes from increasing the exploitation of their workforce--walmart lowballs their suppliers, they are the garbage heap of tnc supply chains, not only encouraging but effectively forcing the worst kinds of labor abuses.

but do the research for yourself--the facts are easy to find on this one.


i am doing that right now.

[/QUOTE]think of the employees who choose to work at Walmart.[/QUOTE]

um...there is already enough information in this thread about walmart's labor practices in the states. not going for this one again. not worth it.

give me a break, ace.

um....yes.

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spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

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