Walmart: “Not Financially Feasible” To Take Minimal, Legally Required Steps to Save Workers’ Lives December 6, 2012
Posted by rogerhollander in Bangladesh, Labor.Tags: bangladesh, capitalism, industrial safety, labor, labour, roger hollander, walmart, worker safety, workers, workers rights
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by Abby Zimet
In the wake of last month’s fire in a Bangladesh garment factory that killed over 100 workers, Bloomberg has gained access to notes from a 2011 meeting where Walmart officials decided against paying suppliers high enough prices to cover costs of needed safety improvements because they deemed it “not financially feasible for the brands to make such investments.” The meeting was attended by more than a dozen retailers, including Gap, Target and JC Penney. Over 300 Bangladeshi garment factory workers have died since 2006. Walmart reported a 9% increase in third-quarter net income, bringing their earnings for that quarter to $3.63 billion. An estimated half of Bangladesh’s garment factories don’t meet legally required work safety standards. At a fire in a nearby warehouse two days after the Tazreen factory fire, workers had to climb down a bamboo pole because they couldn’t get to the stairs; graffiti on a restroom wall there read: “Work here and your life is a living hell.”
“Specifically to the issue of any corrections on electrical and fire safety, we are talking about 4,500 factories, and in most cases very extensive and costly modifications would need to be undertaken to some factories,” they said in the document. “It is not financially feasible for the brands to make such investments.”
COMMENTS
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gardenernorcal
“It is not financially feasible for the brands to make such investments.”
Guess what if that is their firm position, then mine is: It’s no longer morally feasible for me to purchase your goods. I am thinking if fewer people buy their goods they may change their way of thinking.
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sLiM_mC_sHaDy
Yes, please do not shop there. I never have; they sicken me.
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Catherine Carre
People forget that it is precisely this type of immoral exploitation that led Marx and Engels to develop their communist philosophy…Engels’ “The condition of the working class in England” describes very similar conditions as suffered by those workers in developing countries employed by behemoths such as Walmart…communism is the child of capitalism..
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nveric
Show me how Communism works?
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Tom Carberry
Communism works fine in Cuba, despite over 60 years of a crushing blockade. Communism worked fine in the Soviet Union if you consider general equality and the absence of crime a good life. Muhammad Ali said he felt safer in Moscow than any other city in the world, because it had no crime.
Communism had its horrors, like Stalin’s gulags. But the American slavery system, followed by 160 years of Jim Crow, and the largest prison system in the history of the world (dwarfing Stalin’s gulags at their largest point), makes those horrors look like minor glitches.
And don’t forget the many tens of millions of people America has slaughtered in its wars for profit.
American capitalism works for the top 20% of the people, but not for the rest.
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Gubdeb
I dunno…which is worse?: 1: Walmart, or, 2: the MIC/American Capitalism that makes a “Walmart”possible? How many wars did we wage to get to this point. How many “Deals” were cut to have these products sold here? (see NAFTA & Robert Reich) The POINT is, until we face who we really are, things will never change. Walmart is just a symptom, not the problem.
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AmonVerite
Here is the problem:
http://www.stateofnature.org/d…
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giovannalepore
Remember Bhopal India and now Bangladesh: Symbols of why they hate the USA. Your “democracy” and “freedom” are nothing but smoke screens for crimes against humanity.
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Gubdeb
I thought Indians loved the USA(?) Why, the MSM in recent years has woven Indians into the very fabric of American life. In network programming, ads, and they seem to all love Walmart. Yes, Walmart.
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giovannalepore
I doubt that this is the case with the overwhelming numbers of Indians IN India especially those who were the US victims. At the rate the US is going it will have the entire world despise it.
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Matthew Grebenc
Money is power, and corporations pursue it at any cost. They are psychopathic.
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wildcarrots
Well yes there is a sick mentality. Once a factory burns down it will have to been re-built or replaced. You either re-build it before or after the employees are there working. that is the sick really stupid part.
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theoldgoat
This is where we are, its emblematic of the massive shift that must be brought about in order to restore balance.
“Work here and your life is a living hell.”
… the system, owned by interests that value profit over life, scorn those who see from other perspectives – an absolutely essential aspect of life – yet do so brutally, without compunction, on the backs of BILLIONS OF PEOPLE AROUND THE WORLD>
Boycott any brand you cannot identify and source to ethical satisfaction.
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itsthethird
Corporations and workers can take the heat while the stockholders, capitalists, consumers, and management, can take the profits. However the costs of profit are spread disproportionate to benefits if any exist the benefits are captured immediately while costs are avoided by all. The whole system is dysfunctional because cost avoidance or shifting is acceptable and or encouraged.
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greatbear215
Walmurder: Were they value profits over people!
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Shantiananda
Not just Walmart, but the whole American Empire, “value profits over people”! Walmart is just the paradigm of the American corportocracy.
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AmonVerite
As seen here:
http://www.stateofnature.org/d…
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Gubdeb
Thank you, Shan.
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18 comments
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gardenernorcal•3 hours ago “It is not financially feasible for the brands to make such investments.”
Guess what if that is their firm position, then mine is: It’s no longer morally feasible for me to purchase your goods. I am thinking if fewer people buy their goods they may change their way of thinking.
-
sLiM_mC_sHaDy gardenernorcal•3 hours ago Yes, please do not shop there. I never have; they sicken me.
-
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Catherine Carre•2 hours ago People forget that it is precisely this type of immoral exploitation that led Marx and Engels to develop their communist philosophy…Engels’ “The condition of the working class in England” describes very similar conditions as suffered by those workers in developing countries employed by behemoths such as Walmart…communism is the child of capitalism..
-
nveric Catherine Carre•an hour ago Show me how Communism works?
-
Tom Carberry nveric•6 minutes ago Communism works fine in Cuba, despite over 60 years of a crushing blockade. Communism worked fine in the Soviet Union if you consider general equality and the absence of crime a good life. Muhammad Ali said he felt safer in Moscow than any other city in the world, because it had no crime.
Communism had its horrors, like Stalin’s gulags. But the American slavery system, followed by 160 years of Jim Crow, and the largest prison system in the history of the world (dwarfing Stalin’s gulags at their largest point), makes those horrors look like minor glitches.
And don’t forget the many tens of millions of people America has slaughtered in its wars for profit.
American capitalism works for the top 20% of the people, but not for the rest.
-
-
-
Gubdeb•an hour ago I dunno…which is worse?: 1: Walmart, or, 2: the MIC/American Capitalism that makes a “Walmart”possible? How many wars did we wage to get to this point. How many “Deals” were cut to have these products sold here? (see NAFTA & Robert Reich) The POINT is, until we face who we really are, things will never change. Walmart is just a symptom, not the problem.
-
AmonVerite Gubdeb•37 minutes ago Here is the problem:
http://www.stateofnature.org/d…
-
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giovannalepore•3 hours ago Remember Bhopal India and now Bangladesh: Symbols of why they hate the USA. Your “democracy” and “freedom” are nothing but smoke screens for crimes against humanity.
-
Gubdeb giovannalepore•an hour ago I thought Indians loved the USA(?) Why, the MSM in recent years has woven Indians into the very fabric of American life. In network programming, ads, and they seem to all love Walmart. Yes, Walmart.
-
giovannalepore Gubdeb•4 minutes ago I doubt that this is the case with the overwhelming numbers of Indians IN India especially those who were the US victims. At the rate the US is going it will have the entire world despise it.
-
-
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Matthew Grebenc•3 hours ago Money is power, and corporations pursue it at any cost. They are psychopathic.
-
wildcarrots Matthew Grebenc•2 hours ago Well yes there is a sick mentality. Once a factory burns down it will have to been re-built or replaced. You either re-build it before or after the employees are there working. that is the sick really stupid part.
-
-
theoldgoat•3 hours ago This is where we are, its emblematic of the massive shift that must be brought about in order to restore balance.
“Work here and your life is a living hell.”
… the system, owned by interests that value profit over life, scorn those who see from other perspectives – an absolutely essential aspect of life – yet do so brutally, without compunction, on the backs of BILLIONS OF PEOPLE AROUND THE WORLD>
Boycott any brand you cannot identify and source to ethical satisfaction.
-
itsthethird•3 hours ago Corporations and workers can take the heat while the stockholders, capitalists, consumers, and management, can take the profits. However the costs of profit are spread disproportionate to benefits if any exist the benefits are captured immediately while costs are avoided by all. The whole system is dysfunctional because cost avoidance or shifting is acceptable and or encouraged.
-
greatbear215•3 hours ago Walmurder: Were they value profits over people!
-
Shantiananda greatbear215•2 hours ago Not just Walmart, but the whole American Empire, “value profits over people”! Walmart is just the paradigm of the American corportocracy.
-
Gubdeb Shantiananda•an hour ago Thank you, Shan.
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