California to Walmart: We Don't Need Your Jobs, Low Prices
Thought exercise: you're a legislator in a state that has nearly 12 percent unemployment, the highest cost of living in the contiguous U.S., and a budget deficit of nearly $11 billion. How do you kick start economic growth? Well, if you're California, you tell those big box stores what they can do with their low prices and abundant jobs. According to a story in the San Diego Union-Tribune:
Without a vote to spare, the state Senate on Tuesday approved legislation aimed at requiring an extensive economic analysis before selected superstores can be opened.
The measure grew out of heated debate in San Diego, where a council majority unsuccessfully tried to limit future expansion by Walmart.
Senate Bill 469 would affect superstores of more than 90,000 square feet that dedicate 10 percent of that space to nontaxable items, mostly food. Walmart and some newer Target stores are the most likely to be affected if the measure becomes law.
Membership stores, such as Costco, are exempt.
Sen. Juan Vargas, a San Diego Democrat carrying the measure, said communities are not armed with a complete set of facts when such stores attempt to move in. Vargas said his bill would not prohibit approval of such stores regardless of what an analysis reveals.
“The bill says the locals get to make the decision,” Vargas said. “However, they will make an informed decision.”
The economic analysis would have to address the store’s impact on jobs, taxes, property values, traffic and government services, among other issues. Opponents of a similar ordinance in San Diego said the measure was a thinly veiled effort by organized labor and their supporters to ban those superstores ...
This is the problem with California government in microcosm: lower and middle-income workers have their opportunities for work delayed or denied while a team of government bureaucrats with gold-plated pensions attempt to perform a cost-benefit analysis on one of the most succesful companies in world history. Note to Senator Vargas: locals already get to make informed decisions. And taken in aggregate, those decisions are called the market.
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Feb '11
Re: California to Walmart: We Don't Need Your Jobs, Low Prices
Sen. Juan Vargas is a union tool! The City Council tried to essentially ban Walmart from expanding but the company secured enough signatures for a ballot measure that would have allowed the stores to open thus supercededing their power. Only then did the Council fold and that's when the union thugs went to Sen. Vargas. The proposed locations are where they are needed the most: low to middle income areas.
Edited on Jun 1, 2011 at 3:00pmMar '11
Re: California to Walmart: We Don't Need Your Jobs, Low Prices
It's a little like those horrific videos of the tsunami: just when you think the stoopid has crested, a brand new mountain of stoopid comes crashing in.
I suppose there is some kind of legislation on what constitutes a "membership" store, but if dancing around this law could be accomplished by selling a card for a dollar, then I don't think Walmart would have any difficulty thumbing its nose at this law. Especially if they never bother checking for the cards.
Dec '10
Re: California to Walmart: We Don't Need Your Jobs, Low Prices
This measure is intended to intimidate Wal-Mart, Target and other general merchandise superstore operators from expanding their grocery business. The heavily unionized supermarkets in California don't want Target Greatland, Wal-Mart, and Fred Meyer coming in with one-stop alternatives that let customers pick up everything they need in one trip without having to make a separate run to the grocery store. Note, however, that supermarkets carry a lot of sundries, up to and including motor oil, so they want to reserve to themselves the right to horn in on other stores' lines of business.
May '10
Re: California to Walmart: We Don't Need Your Jobs, Low Prices
Troy Senik:
There's your 1984 homage of the day. Our politicians have the power to do anything except plainly state what they are doing.
Dec '10
Re: California to Walmart: We Don't Need Your Jobs, Low Prices
I do concur that it is insane to prevent *anyone* from opening a business in our blighted inner cities. I also think it is foolish to imagine the big box model-- employ vast amounts of the lowest possible wage labor selling foreign high-end manufactured goods for marginally less retail cost-- is a good model for the long-term health of our economy.
Jan '11
Re: California to Walmart: We Don't Need Your Jobs, Low Prices
This state cannot be bailed out when it inevitably crashes. Wasn't it yesterday they had the story of San Diego requiring EPA permits for firework shows? I have family in California (and our Ricochet benfactors as well) but collectively that state has 'called down the thunder' - I don't feel we have any responsibility to save it.
Apr '11
Re: California to Walmart: We Don't Need Your Jobs, Low Prices
Vargas said membership stores are exempt because “They do pay a living wage.”
Well, that's all right, then.
If California State Senator Juan Vargas says it's so, then dang it, it's so!
Sep '10
Re: California to Walmart: We Don't Need Your Jobs, Low Prices
????
May '11
Re: California to Walmart: We Don't Need Your Jobs, Low Prices
Spoken like a true Socialist "directed economy" believer. Please read Thomas Sowell's, Basic Economics.
Wages are an agreement between the employer and employee as to the perceived value of the position. If the employee is worth more than the employer thinks the job merits, the employee is free to work elsewhere and usually does. (A saying back home : "I was looking for a job when I found this one.)
As for "long term health of our economy", getting regulators out of the way will go a long way toward that goal.
Sep '10
Re: California to Walmart: We Don't Need Your Jobs, Low Prices
Charlotte Reineck: Vargas said membership stores are exempt because “They do pay a living wage.”
Well, that's all right, then.
If California State Senator Juan Vargas says it's so, then dang it, it's so! · Jun 1 at 6:25pm
Sam's Club, a (gasp!) Wal-Mart owned "membership store," pays roughly the same for entry-level positions as Wal-Mart.
But "paying a living wage" isn't the issue--the issue is the union-beholden politician hates the (mostly) non-union Wal-Mart.
Apr '11
Re: California to Walmart: We Don't Need Your Jobs, Low Prices
I'm not a Californian and maybe I'm confusing San Diego with another city. I thought that San Diego used to be considered an outpost of conservatism in the Golden State. What happened?