Tabula Rasa
Wal-Mart Needs to Deal with Its Health Care Mess
Julie Casper Roth
Issue date: 11/3/05 Section: Opinion
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I grew up shopping at Kmart, and the big thrill was heading to the neighboring city to shop at Target. But it wasn't until Wal-Mart made plans to build in my hometown that anyone got excited about over-grown convenience stores. We had all heard of Wal-Mart, but not many of us had ever seen one. The newspaper tracked the physical progress of the new Wal-Mart building on a regular basis, and in a town with high unemployment rates, the new jobs the company would offer created a buzz.
I remember walking into Wal-Mart with my parents on its opening day. Wal-Mart was an amazing sight to behold. My parents bought two lamps that opening day. I was amazed at how such style could be bought for so little money. It was six months later, when I realized that everyone else in town owned the same lamps, that the Wal-Mart aura began to fade. A couple of my out-of-work relatives couldn't get by on their Wal-Mart salaries, and the job became insulting to some of them when their kids joined them at the next register over. Unemployment rates remained high in my hometown and unskilled labor had a regular turnover. Wal-Mart wasn't fixing anything in the community.
Many of us are used to taking swings at Wal-Mart and even those with a strong Wal-Mart allegiance certainly couldn't have missed the decade-or-so-long campaign that has been waged against the company. Unfair hiring practices, the exploitation of workers, and the dearth of employee benefits has made Wal-Mart an easy target for critics. With last year's earnings rounding out at approximately $10.5 billion, one would think criticisms hit the Wal-Mart corporate wall without so much as leaving a scratch. An internal Wal-Mart memo that was released last week supposedly says otherwise. But if Wal-Mart is braced for criticism, it certainly isn't doing a good job of preventing it.
While last week's memo seriously addresses the topic of public image, it doesn't specifically take aim to improve it. The corporation suggested hiring "healthier" employees less reliant on health coverage. The memo also stated, "Our workers are getting sicker than the national population, particularly with obesity-related diseases." These two comments translated could amount to hiring-related discrimination revolving around age and body type. The memo also suggests "[offering] benefits to healthy associates." Immediately following this suggestion is the example of "an education offering targeted at students." This again implies that being healthy is synonymous with age. Wal-Mart also takes blatant notice in its memo that its "workforce is aging faster than the national average." The memo is built around the notion that age and health are synonymous.
I remember walking into Wal-Mart with my parents on its opening day. Wal-Mart was an amazing sight to behold. My parents bought two lamps that opening day. I was amazed at how such style could be bought for so little money. It was six months later, when I realized that everyone else in town owned the same lamps, that the Wal-Mart aura began to fade. A couple of my out-of-work relatives couldn't get by on their Wal-Mart salaries, and the job became insulting to some of them when their kids joined them at the next register over. Unemployment rates remained high in my hometown and unskilled labor had a regular turnover. Wal-Mart wasn't fixing anything in the community.
Many of us are used to taking swings at Wal-Mart and even those with a strong Wal-Mart allegiance certainly couldn't have missed the decade-or-so-long campaign that has been waged against the company. Unfair hiring practices, the exploitation of workers, and the dearth of employee benefits has made Wal-Mart an easy target for critics. With last year's earnings rounding out at approximately $10.5 billion, one would think criticisms hit the Wal-Mart corporate wall without so much as leaving a scratch. An internal Wal-Mart memo that was released last week supposedly says otherwise. But if Wal-Mart is braced for criticism, it certainly isn't doing a good job of preventing it.
While last week's memo seriously addresses the topic of public image, it doesn't specifically take aim to improve it. The corporation suggested hiring "healthier" employees less reliant on health coverage. The memo also stated, "Our workers are getting sicker than the national population, particularly with obesity-related diseases." These two comments translated could amount to hiring-related discrimination revolving around age and body type. The memo also suggests "[offering] benefits to healthy associates." Immediately following this suggestion is the example of "an education offering targeted at students." This again implies that being healthy is synonymous with age. Wal-Mart also takes blatant notice in its memo that its "workforce is aging faster than the national average." The memo is built around the notion that age and health are synonymous.