Wal-Mart keeps leaning more Communist

"If Wal-Mart were an individual economy, it would rank as China's eighth-biggest trading partner, ahead of Russia, Australia and Canada," Xu said.
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More than 5,000 Chinese enterprises have established steady supply alliances with Wal-Mart.
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Insiders point out Wal-Mart's imports from China have largely influenced the US trade deficit in China"

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/english/doc/2004-11/29/content_395728.htm

Don't it figure. I haven't heard them talking about supporting american business in a long time.

I was in REI the other day and I started looking around at the price tags of alot of the higher quality clothing that they sell and then I realized that since WallyWorld has become such an 800 lb gorilla and shoved alot of retailers out of the way it seems like the middle ground quality stuff is dissappearing. It's like you're stuck with either lower quality goods at very reasonable prices or stuck paying a fat premium for high quality stuff. Maybe I'm wrong but it does seem harder to find the middle ground stuff.

hmmm, walmart does it bigger and better than others, and this somehow makes them evil?

this might be a good topic down below, if ya get my drift.

Bob

I think with a little self control we can keep this civil.

Walmart is what it is, and has never tried to hide what it is - determined grit yer teeth low pricing for not bad quality, and China happens to be where that is right now.

The rest is up to us when we decide where to go shopping, and "our" latest judgement so far has been...

Imagine that someday there was a 3W current regulated 2AA luxeon light in HAIII with 27 mm reflector and UCL type lens being sold for $10.50 shipped ($100 flat for a dozen pack), except it comes from - say - Syria. What would you do?

Very interesting. Thanks for the link.

Walmart buys this stuff because Americans will buy it/are buying it. Americans largely are just not worried about Communism anymore (not that I agree with them, this is just my observation). We live in a consumer based society that is far more concerned with having a shawl like Paris Hilton wears, cheap tv/dvd players to put in each child's bedroom so they won't make noise and bother their parents, or the latest basktball shoes some play wore in last weeks game. The problem is as much us as it is them.

I'm not sure just what you mean by your title. Wal-Mart is probably the most Capitalistic organization on the planet! They are profit driven and could care less as to what system of government they have to deal with. Make sure that you understand the difference between government systems and economic systems.

we have seen the enemy...

They buy from China simply because it makes the most economical sense... /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/icon3.gif

I don't understand the point of this thread. Now if you want to discuss China, THATs an interesting topic...

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/04_49/b3911401.htm

...and VERY scary for American manufacturing.

Mark

[ QUOTE ]
kenny said:
we have seen the enemy...

[/ QUOTE ]
And they have good deals !

surrender to low prices!

Maybe the south=park episode wan't extreme enough.

I would agree that a very large percentage of the stuff Walmart sells is made in China.

And since Walmart is BIG, they buy a LOT from China.

China should fall under the spell of Capitalism though, so I ain't as worried as maybe I ought to be...

Isn't this how capitalism works? Actually isn't this sort of a good thing? I mean for China to avoid going bankrupt like hte USSR did, they had to open up a bit and accept some capitalism. That seems to be a good thing. Unless of course they have a long term goal of burying the US economically, which is ery poosible given the fact that we seem to want to bankrupt ourselves. No Western nation though, is a producer anymore really. Western Europe, the US and Canada all are buyers from Eastern Europe, and Asia. Places with cheap labor. Maybe at some point the incomes and wages of the world will equalise, and I do think this will happen as the "third world" becomes more industrialised and catches up to the West. Then things will even out worldwide.

My only concern, is how Walmart's dependence on China, influences our nation's policies with China, relative to it's neighbors (Japan, North and South Korea, and Taiwan). Walmart is the 800 pound guerilla in retail, becoming more powerful and influential every day. Could Walmart force the administration to backpedal it's foreign policy, to protect Walmart? What would happen to Walmart, for instance, if the administration decided to declare a trade embargo, to prevent an invasion of Taiwan? Would Walmart survive, without the huge amount of cheap merchandise they get from China? Would Walmart allow this to happen? I can picture the army of Walmart lobbyists, converging on Washington, if it felt threatened. Is this good for America? What about human rights, fair trade, or child labor?

oldgrandpajack

I could care less where wal-mart or target or whatever retailed gets their product. What I care about is the continued trade imbalance. Any country simply cannot continue to send out more money than it takes in.

China went capitalist long ago. It's now one of the most work and money oriented countries on the planet. The Chinese learned from the USSR collapse that a centralized economy would not work in the fast-moving age of the micro-ship and the information economy.

The problems arise in the political sphere- the government still tries to control political speech and action. However, that control is now being lifted step by step. This lifting of control is by design.

An interesting aside about Chinese manufacturing- like the destroyed economies of Germany and Japan after WWII- the Chinese are building their new economy from the bottom up and putting in state of the art manufacturing plants. Much of it world-class.

Well, for what it's worth, and it's a fact that's not oft taken into consideration...

It may seem like Americans as a whole just sit on their butts and waste away, basking in foreign inputs with no domestic enterprise aside from managerial positions...

The United States is still by far the largest exporter of goods in the world.

Yes, we have a trade deficit. Economics that you hear on TV are five second sound bytes that can't possibly explain anything in any accurate detail.

Purchasing goods from China isn't necessarily a bad thing. China has a greater advantage in producing goods that if produced in our own industries would cost A LOT more, which boils down to higher prices for us as end-consumers. The money will flow to the place that has the greatest comparative advantage in their goods.

Lastly, if the low prices we can afford are to be kept, there are two options: Find the cheapest producer abroad, or sacrifice our own luxuries to adopt the lifestyle and pay of the Chinese and other such regions. I for one will take the lower prices.

China will eventually reach a point where their workers demand more and more pay, and goods from them will no longer be as affordable. When that happens the world will find the next country that will work for low wages and the cycle will begin again.

Wal-Mart seems to be an example of why no single player in a chain should be allowed to become too powerful.

Wal-Mart has grown so large and is such a huge percentage of the market for consumer-goods manufcaturers that they have tremendous leverage over their suppliers - enough to squeeze their suppliers to the point that many don't make much anything on sales to Wal-Mart. Consumers might see slightly lower prices as a result of these deals, but it really just means higher profits for Wal-Mart.

A company I used to work for was trying to score a big deal with Wal-Mart to supply them with equipment for use in their stores. Every time we cleared a hurdle, another hurdle materialized. Securing the deal never quite happened, and we got the impression that Wal-Mart wanted it that way because they kept getting "deal-maker" prices (read: we weren't making much) on the equipment.

Roy,

The title was a joke, don't take it so personal.

The idea that buying goods from china is good for american consumers is only valid as long as the ammerican consumer can still buy them.

If you work in a factory, you may lose your job to china
If you work in textiles, you may lose your job to china
If you make high tech equipment (radio, flashlight, computer, etc),you may lose your job to china
And on and on and on....

If you manage someone who does any of the above, or sell things to them or perform services for them, you may lose your job when they lose theirs.

Much of our high tech industry is being outsourced to India and the surrounding area. Much of our manufacturing is going to India and China. What is left for us to transition to?

It seems strange to me that if Toyota sells cars for less than it costs to make them, that's called dumping and we impose import duties to keep it from hurting our businesses. But if China uses cottage industries, child labor and prison labor to make things so cheap that we can not compete, that's OK.

Once in a long while, there are valid situations that call for protectionist tarriffs (import taxes). I think we may be near one of those points. We should put tarriffs on services that are outsourced too.

Daniel