Walmart Argumentative Analysis

I feel that Walmart has a positive and negative impact at the community, in the US and globally. Regrettably the only positive is that they do offer products at a discount price which helps low income people in that community. However, on the negative side, most of Walmart employees are defined as low income families. The documentary showed that “the average pay at Walmart is a little over $13,000 a year. The Federal poverty threshold for a family of four is $17,000.” Poverty is defined as “the lack of resources necessary for material well-being: food, water, housing, land and healthcare” (Nguyen, 2015 ch. 6, slide 3) which indicates that a family will not earn enough working just part time at Walmart. A store manager in the documentary
From the Symbolic Interactionist Perspective, “individuals who are viewed as poor---especially, those receiving public assistance---are often stigmatized as lazy, irresponsible and lacking in abilities, motivation and moral values” (Mooney, Knox & Schact, 2009, Ch. 6, and p 216). Society has labeled individuals who are receiving assistance as “living off the system” however these hard working individuals were encouraged to seek welfare so they could afford their monthly bills. Public Assistance (welfare) is government programs that give temporary assistance for food, housing, medical care, educational assistance, and child care. Healthcare is another negative side of Walmart. Listening to the CEO Lee Scott explain how Walmart is such a great place to work because they offer their employees’ health insurance. Unfortunately, what he doesn’t tell the audience is that the monthly premiums and the deductibles are so high that employees with families cannot afford to participate. The documentary interviewed a mother who could not afford the medicine for her sick child because there were no drug benefits, that she just gave them an aspirin and hoped that worked. With this being said, Walmart is the #1 corporate beneficiary of state public