August 14, 2008

Hate Wal-Mart? Think again.

A few years back a plan was proposed to build a Wal Mart in the small Californian town where I was living at the time. Our local news paper was flooded with letters to the editor opposing the construction. Some claimed that the construction of a Wal-Mart would increase traffic through town. Some argued that it would draw business away from the local main street shops. Some complained that it would ruin the “small town” feel.

First, it is important to keep in mind, “small” is a relative word. When I first moved in the population of our town was about 2,500. Six years later it has grown to more than 150,000. When I moved there I thought I had found the only place north of the Mason Dixon line and west of the Mississippi where people still spent the evenings on rocking chairs on the front porch shouting hey to their neighbors across the street, but that was before we grew up. The Wal-Mart wasn’t the first “big business seen in our town, we already had a TJ Maxx, Raley’s, Home Depot and our very own Indian casino.  I didn’t seem to me like another department store was going to cause us to loose our “small town feel,” if we still had one. No one worried that a Home Depot, or a casino would ruin our town, but God forbid we get a Wal-Mart, I guess that would be the start of the Apocalypse or something.  

Anyone who took the main street through town knew that the traffic problem we had wasn’t because of any department store. The highway heading north stopped when you reached the city limits, and you couldn’t find it again until you had stopped at the light at 1^st street, and 2^nd street, and 3^rd street… Seven streets later you were finally back on the highway. Until the next town. Where you would lather, rinse, and repeat. This worked well when the only people on the road were truckers and loggers, back when the population was 2,500, before everyone started commuting into the City and 8:30 every morning and 5:50 every night. It was the design of the roads, not the establishment of big businesses that created the traffic problem.

The local “mom and pop shops” couldn’t have competed with a Wal-Mart, but they wouldn’t have to. I don’t go to the local shops to buy a three ring binder and new running shorts, because they don’t carry such things. I do go to a local non-corporate coffee shop to get my iced coffee in the morning, and I might go to “Sweetwater Cottage Gifts” to buy a wedding present for an eccentric friend. I visit little shops to buy things I couldn’t find at Wal-Mart. The argument that Wal-Mart would rob the local shops of their business didn’t make sense. It would be like me telling City Council not to build a Best Buy because it might take business from my lemonade stand.

Not only were these arguments purely the product of emotion and an unfounded bias, no one bothered to think about the benefits of building a Wal Mart in our area. A Wal- Mart would have provided tons of revenue that our town desperately needed. Wal-Mart is also has a reputation for being generous, helping out local schools and charities. More importantly, a Wal-Mart would have provided a chance for the lower income resides of our town to get on their feet. It would have provided a place for entry level workers and recent immigrants to get a job to support their families, along with providing low cost food, clothing, and medication. If these people got a job and continued to work they would see great opportunities for advancement, far more than Burger King or Sweetwater Cottage had to offer.  People who had no job and no hope of getting one would have a chance to improve their situation in life, the realization of the American Dream. No one realized that the solution to poverty wasn’t a welfare check, it was a department store.

I can’t explain the prejudice and hatred toward a store that would do nothing but benefit a community. I suspect that is may be a subconscious snobbish-ness. I suspect that many people feel that they are too good for a Wal-Mart. (seriously people, get over yourselves.) In the end, Wal-Mart was not allowed to build in our town, but our population continues to grow, the traffic continues to be disgusting, and the low income families continue to live in their crummy government subsidized apartments. I guess I was the only one who saw Wal-Mart as a way for me to keep more of what I earn and help my town. Because of my city’s blindness I was forced to drive to the Wal-Mart in the next town over, spewing greenhouse gasses and shrinking the poor glaciers, but that is another story entirely.