WalMart, the great saviour of small format filmmaking...

[marc]

Am I missing something here? It seems that people are grouping Japan with all of these other third world countries with respect to manufacturing and cameras in particular. Japan is/was a major economic empire. Their economy was rebuilt after WWII with the help of the U.S. In fact, they mastered industry so well that they did it better than their teachers. That is why Japan produces some of the best quality engineered products in the world. They developed management techniques that brought Industrial Psychology to the cutting edge. Worker welfare and happiness have been a major priority in Japanese industry.

[Evan Kubota]

"How do you "move about" when you have little more than the clothes on your back? Where, exactly, do you go?"

It doesn't seem to stop the continuous influx of Mexican immigrants, or the 'boat people' who came from Laos and Vietnam in the '70s... If you think poverty has *that* strong of a lockdown effect on Americans, think about the rest of the world :roll:

marc: I'm half Japanese. Generally Japanese manufactured goods are excellent quality. However, the reason those products were able to saturate the American market in the '80s and late '70s is because of dumping practices... although Japanese products are well-made, the labor force making TVs and such was primarily young women with few other job opportunities. I don't know that I would say worker welfare (especially in desk jobs) is a huge priority... unless working in a cubicle for 12 hours a day counts as satisfaction. On the other side of the coin, their American counterparts in desk jobs might have a company gym and flowers in the lobby, but their jobs could be gone tomorrow. :lol: Until fairly recently many Japanese corporations had lifetime employment.

[Scott Spears]

Here's a fun fact about Walmart, because they pay their workers such low wages those employees use approx. $1.8 billion in public funded health services. That's basically a subsidy for Walmart. Heck, yeah, pay those workers as little as you can get away with so you can pocket as much profits as possible.

A study was done in communities where Walmarts came to town and they found that they were a slight drain on the local economy. Local officials see this huge sales tax generator, but if you factor in the small business that get run over and the taxes that their employees paid, it's a wash. They basically equal out. If you add the health care cost put on the community, that's where they start to be a drain.

Meanwhile, CostCo averages $17 per hour for it's employees and it's CEO's salary is around $325,000 per year. (He has tons of stock, so he makes money if the company makes money. If it doesn't he doesn't.) Now that's respecting your work force.

Walmart is capitalism on steriods. It becomes this mindless money making/low price machine. Exploit anything you can to get as low prices as possible and who cares if some 14 year old in Honduras has to work 10 hours a day in a sweat shop. It capitolism and anybody who dares to speak against it is a dirty commie.

Walmart is crack for for poor people.

Scott

[monobath]

monobath: Clearly you know your political philosophy, but what part of Norseman's first-hand acccount of conditions in depressed economic communities did you miss?

Again:

Someone mentioned that no one is forcing people to work at Wal-Mart, that it's their choice. Not for the many people across the country who live in small towns, or rural areas. In these places, there are no other jobs to be had, so it's either low paying Wal-Mart, or welfare. And again, Wal-Mart knows this and takes advantage of it.

For you to make the statement that "no one is forcing anyone to stay where they are," is the height of arrogance and reveals a serious lack of understanding of how poor and working class people live and work. How do you "move about" when you have little more than the clothes on your back? Where, exactly, do you go?

Enjoyed reading your political philosphy post nonetheless.

Tim

Tim, I'm glad you enjoyed reading my post. Capitalism is an economic system, though, not a political one.

Where do you go when you're poor? Well, if you're resourceful and intelligent, you go where the work is, or you rely on your own skills to create work wherever you are. People are a lot more resourceful than you and Norseman seem to want to give them credit for. The bleak picture you paint is the unrealistic one.

I come from a large family. Many of my family members are poor. So poor, in fact, that they have had to borrow money for a U-Haul trailer to move cross country in search of work. One did recently move from one state to another, by thumb you might say, with nothing more than the clothes on his back. His choice. We'd have helped him if he'd have accepted it. And he's doing much better now. None of my family members have ever considered themselves chained to one spot.

Have you ever lived in a small town and been forced to work for Wal-Mart because no other jobs were available? If there were no other jobs available, where did the townspeople get the money to shop at Wal-Mart? People who live in small towns aren't necessarily poor, and even the poor ones tend to be creative and resourceful. I've known plenty of them, since so many of my family members prefer to live in small towns. They aren't the poor helpless lost downtrodden that you describe. And most of them that I know love Wal-Mart and K-Mart and Target and Sam's Wholesale if they're lucky enough to have one nearby.

What first-hand experience do you have of the plight of the poor that you describe? Since you are posting frequently on this forum, I assume you at least have enough leisure time to make it to the library and use their computers if you don't happen to own a computer of your own. Since you talk about filmmaking, I assume you make enough money to buy a camera and some film. Why do you think you understand poor people better than I do? Someone has fed you a line, Tim, and I very much doubt it was one of the poor and working class people you're talking about.

[MovieStuff]

How do you "move about" when you have little more than the clothes on your back? Where, exactly, do you go?

You are basically defeating your own point. If the locals are so poor that they have only the clothes on their back and can't leave the area in the first place, then that means they are most likely unskilled and have little in the way of opportunity. If any company comes along and looks around and says, "Gee, the people here are eating dirt, we could set up a store and pay them minimum wage and I bet they'll take it,", is that exploitation? Or is it paying people what they are worth? Five dollars is a fortune if you don't have it and need it.

I'm not taking sides but there is a fine line between making effective use of local labor and actual exploitation. Just because people do a job that you or I wouldn't want to do at a wage that you or I would not find acceptable doesn't mean that they aren't happy with their situation in life. To force them to accept that they should be unhappy is not only demeaning but arrogant. And I suspect that the amount of money that Walmart makes is more of a sticking point with idealists than the actual amount of money that the workers get paid. I see this all the time in low budget films where some disgruntled actor that was waiting tables and lucky to pulldown $20 a performance in local theater suddenly feels "cheated" because he only got paid $3500 for a month's worth of work on a low budget independent film that suddenly made a lot of money. Walmart is doing well but there is no guarantee of profits in any business and Walmart certainly doesn't set up shop in areas where the work force is saturated by college grads with phd's in physics. Perhaps monobaths comment should be modified to read, "no one is making them work there, even though local economics might make it seem advantageous to do so".

People can do only what they can afford to do. That applies to everyone, including me and you.

Roger

[tlatosmd]

But how then are any of us going to get stoned?

If you don't know that, outta my way! Anyone here interested in counter-culture should know that! ;)

His name is Robert Paulson
His name is Robert Paulson
His name is Robert Paulson
His name is Robert Paulson
His name is Robert Paulson
His name is Robert Paulson

*rofl*

[MovieStuff]

Here's a fun fact about Walmart, because they pay their workers such low wages those employees use approx. $1.8 billion in public funded health services.....

If you add the health care cost put on the community, that's where they start to be a drain.

And how were they paying for their health care before they had jobs at Walmart? Not defending Walmart but I think that is a fair question.

Roger

[MovieStuff]

"How do you "move about" when you have little more than the clothes on your back? Where, exactly, do you go?"

It doesn't seem to stop the continuous influx of Mexican immigrants, or the 'boat people' who came from Laos and Vietnam in the '70s... If you think poverty has *that* strong of a lockdown effect on Americans, think about the rest of the world

Very good point, Evan.

Roger

[monobath]

By the way, if anyone needs a refresher course on the various World Economic Systems, this authoritative site from The Virtual Church of the Blind Chihuahua uses a simple two-cow paradigm to illustrate the differences.

Enjoy.

[monobath]

On a more serious note, On Sweatshop Wages

[etimh]

Capitalism is an economic system, though, not a political one.

I understand the strict definition of capitalism as an economic system. I think my loose reference to your post as a discussion of political philosophy considers the fact that "capitalism" today functions primarily as a component element in a wider Western democratic nation-state "ideology."

I think that your family member's story of determination and resilience is admirable. But success or failure for individuals in such circumstances depends on a number of key qualifiers that you failed to note. First, it seems that you maintain a strong familial support network that at least allows for the potential of basic resources if your family member needed it. Whether he chose to access it in this specific case is irrelevant. It is, however, a big factor in determining people's potential opportunities when they choose to move for employment purposes. A significant number of the homeless that I've worked with, who are not suffering some mental illness, are indigent working folk who failed to establish a stable living situation after migrating from elsewhere. Other determining factors include, of course, gender, age, class background, and perhaps most importantly, race. Basic opportunity, and the potential for success in negotiating drastic life changes, are intimately linked to race and ethnicity status.

People are a lot more resourceful than you and Norseman seem to want to give them credit for. The bleak picture you paint is the unrealistic one.

I have an unwavering faith in the potential resourcefulness and desire of people who to want to make their lives better. But your anecdotal experience seems a bit parochial and somewhat niave in its lack of consideration of the contemporary reality of poverty in America. That being said, I suppose its time to validate my credentials by answering some of your personal questions regarding my background.

Both of my parents were working-class poor, born and raised in urban centers. I personally grew up modest middle-class, in a working-class suburb of Los Angeles, certainly not a childhood of privelege.

What first-hand experience do you have of the plight of the poor that you describe?

As an adult, I have traveled, lived, and worked in depressed, poverty-stricken communities both rural and urban. I have worked with the working poor in union orgainzation as well as in basic infrastructure programs for extremely depressed rural communities. Admittedly, I don't have the unique cultural experiences and traits that come with a rural poor background, and small town life is certainly not my lifestyle of choice at the present time. Today, I am a creature of relative privelege with all of the comforts and benefits that come with that. But I'm also a creature of social conscious, determined by a life of critical and philosophical inquiry, as well as social activism.

I've found that in many of the posts on this board there is an odd and disturbing disconnect in discussions concerning the realities of disenfranchised communities. I know that privelege tends to obscure and insulate against the harshness of the world outside. But I'm genuinely surprized sometimes at the apparent lack of consciousness and sensitivity expressed here regarding social issues. I don't know, and don't care, if I understand poor people "better" than you. But I do know a few important things about poor and disenfranchised folks and the communities they come from. Some things that you and others have never experienced, have forgotten, or choose to ignore.

With respect,

Tim

[super8man]

OK, I have to chime in here...Monobah: I enjoyed your two cows link...great fun...heard it before but always a good read...now, I hapily click the next link you give...what happens: I GET A FUCKING POPUP FOR AMAZON.DOT.COM BABY!!!!!!! OK, am I the only one here that finds this incredibly ironic???? Jesus H Christ, I try and learn about another person's point of view on, of all things, sweatshop wages and I have to fucking click a ACCEPT/DECLINE cookie popup for AMAZON...

OK, I have vented now...everyone, please return to your chinese made keyboards on you dell desktops and keep clicking away in your malaysian packaged XP OS software...Oops, my samsung syncmaster 750s screen is starting to flicker...perhaps I should buy another from amazon so I can get free shipping and avoid state sales taxes since Amazon is based in Nevada and I am in California...and while I am at it, I think I will call the directv help line so that some chick in fucking Phillipines can answer the phone and sound like she is from Texas...nice.

OK, rant over .... rant on people!!

PS - apologies to the more sensitive types...its a Canadian thing...sort of like our beer - its stronger but the label still says 5% but we all know which beer is pisswater and which is real.

[Scott Spears]

Roger,

A fair question.

I would guess that they got their health care paid for by the state, but wouldn't it be nice if Walmart paid their workers enough money to afford health care like many other companies. State jobs do this and so do many other companies.

Scott

[super8man]

"I've found that in many of the posts on this board there is an odd and disturbing disconnect in discussions concerning the realities of disenfranchised communities."

WORD!

This should go into the hall of fame for clarity...I like this.

[monobath]

Roger,

A fair question.

I would guess that they got their health care paid for by the state, but wouldn't it be nice if Walmart paid their workers enough money to afford health care like many other companies. State jobs do this and so do many other companies.

Scott

Anything paid for by the state is paid with funds stolen from your pocket and mine. Taxes aren't voluntary, and welfare isn't charity.

I wonder why the dirt-poor of Mexico don't grovel in their mud huts like helpless Americans, waiting for a Wal-Mart to bless their town with new job opportunities? Why do you suppose they come here? Is it to suck off the teat of the great welfare cow? I don't think so. I think it's because they haven't been raised on the milk of that cow, slothful and expecting handouts, so they are willing to come with nothing but the wet shirt on their backs to find work.