Hasty Conclusion

Dear Mr. Maich,

You have allowed me to complete my view on the Wal-Mart issue. I could not help to think better of Wal-Mart when you gave example of the town Miramichi to show that Wal-Mart can create not only jobs and revenues but also happiness. You announced that Wal-Mart did not close down nearby stores but it helped to bring new stores in by showing the results from the study made by Ryerson University about the company’s impact on nearby stores. You also talked about the survey taken in 2004 by Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce to show that small-business owners either benefited or had no effect from Wal-Mart opening up near their stores. You pointed out that Wal-Mart benefited poor people with low prices. You also took time to answer most frequent rumors about Wal-Mart. Ill treatments of the Wal-Mart employees were wrong, Wal-Mart’s expensive health care turn out to be false, and Wal-Mart’s anti-Union policy was not because they will lose money but to protect its employees from the Union. How can Wal-Mart be bad when it brings in more jobs, increase local sales, increase productivity, lower prices, and bring happiness (Villarreal 2)?

I agree with your point about how Wal-Mart helps low income households because Wal-Mart has low prices for all their products. I strongly believe that there is no one in the world that wouldn’t mind low price for the same quality. I’m a student, born into a high-middle class family, and even I love those low prices. Knowledge of its presence is soothing and its existence is essential for my survival. Maybe that’s a little too much exaggeration but no doubt that my friends and my family always try to look for ways to get things cheaper. Even though I’m not poor вЂ" thank you, parents вЂ" I still look for ways to get things cheaper. Although my parents do not shop at Wal-Mart, they still shop at retail stores like Costco to enjoy the wealth of low prices. So in terms of how Wal-Mart provides everything in low price, I do believe that Wal-Mart is neither bad nor wrong.

I also agree with you about how in small towns, like Miramichi, benefits exponentially by having Wal-Mart open up in their town. I’ve been to towns in U.S. where it has nothing but a liquor shop and a gas station. For them, having a big retail store like Wal-Mart can be life changing.

However, nothing can be definite. That is why judging if something is good or bad is relative and so hard to determine. How we decide what is good or bad depends on where we draw the line. When the lines are crossed, it is bad, and when it is not, it is good. That is why people agree with each other, and sometimes not, for everyone has different lines drawn for different matters. When people agree, they share the same “line” and when people disagree, they don’t share the same “line.” For example, for matters like murder, vast majority will share the same “line” and would agree that murder is not a line that should be crossed while not everyone would agree that I have crossed the line when I spank my dog for relieving herself on my bed. Just like the matter of me spanking my dog is good or bad, some will agree that Wal-Mart is bad and some will agree that it is good. Although I agree with you on some good points about Wal-Mart, I believe that your evidences might not be strong enough to conclude that Wal-Mart is good and that Wal-Mart do have their faults that must be admitted and fixed.

The article started off with a great example of western edge of Cleveland and its situation regarding rather Wal-Mart should open or not. But other evidences presented in the article were about the cities in Canada and small-business owners across Canada. Those evidences successfully showed that Canada has terrific Wal-Mart but it does not necessarily prove that Wal-Mart is good in other countries. Wal-Mart is a multinational corporation that earns tens of billions of dollars each year (Goldstein 206), so referring to Wal-Mart only in Canada might not be strong enough to conclude that Wal-Mart is good although you have very strong evidences.

According to the article “The Real Facts About Wal-Mart,” California court ordered Wal-Mart to pay $172 million in damages for not allowing meal breaks to about 116,000 workers as required under the state law, and Pennsylvania court approved a class-action lawsuit against Wal-Mart for pressuring workers to work off the clock in Pennsylvania. The class is about 150,000 people including current and former