I've only stepped foot in a Walmart once, but everything I'm wearing was made in China, Pakistan, or Bangledesh. Africa is next. Its a race to the bottom. But I do buy locally whenever possible, it's just not presented often enough as a viable option. I don't have much more to contribute on the matter, other than to point out to sgreger that everything you've said about the impact of the 4 billion (which is actually well over 6 billion) people on this earth, to the earth and it's environment, rather contradicts all of your shit in the global warming threads. I realize this discussion has to do with economics, but you have pointed out the "carbon footprint" of buying at Walmart and then some. Still think we are doing nothing as a plague of 6 billion polluting-ass mu'****ers to affect the envirenoment and global temperatures? Lol suck on that. That's for that shit you said about my momma in that other thread. Go ahead, refute it. Deny any connection to what you've said in the past about "climate change". I'm waiting for it.
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That about sums it up Bro, except I shop walmart at least quarterly for my drugs and other cheap shit I find. Do I hate myself for it? maybe..... What about that I'm just playing the cards I've been dealt.... better way to look at it, if you ask me.....Originally posted by Roo
Edit: I don't buy a tv every quarter,,,, OKComment
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Woah Blue don't freak out on me because I don't shop at Walmart and you do. Believe me, I understand it's the only viable option for 90% of Americans. You know why I hate Walmart, they sell EVERYTHING, including tools, produce, toys, you name it. It all comes from the same factories in Guangdong Province as what's available everywhere else but what drives me batshit about Walmart is that while they are selling tools for $4.99, guess who goes out of business: The 65 year-old dude from your town who's run a hardware store for 40 years selling the same tool for $6.99. Nobody can compete. They set the pricing standards on manufacturing so low that the quality suffers and companies can only afford to produce enough volume at such rock-bottom prices for one client: Walmart. They lose all of their other clients and bingo, Walmart ruins another local economy, from the retailers on down to the suppliers.
That, and there's not a Walmart within 30 miles of me. Because they target small economies with small incomes. That's their MO. And for that, I say **** 'em. But I hold no contempt for people who shop there, because EVERY single person I know who does not live within the city limits of a large metro area shops there. Because, as this thread points out, one's paycheck is ultimately more important to the individual than worrying about local economies. So please don't take offense to what I said. It's not even an option for me. Walmart knows they can't **** with where I live. But they can **** up the rest of the country and keep raking in the dough, and who's to blame? Not the shoppers. Not in this economy. Peace Blue
Edit!!! I re-read our post. You didn;t freak out on me at all. Sorry dude. Sorry about your finger too. Ouch.Comment
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Originally posted by Roo
I no lomger deny that "global warming" is happening, rather i dispute what it means. Science is science and if it is observed to be happening than thats that. I just disagree about the impact and the remedy. I think earth has weathered much worse, and that humans do not effect it enough to bring upon these end of the world scenarious i hear so often. Climate scientists have been wrong too many times, they have shown their ability to predict is about as good as the creationists ability to judge the age of the world. Warming. Yes, but as for its long term disadvantages i remain unclear. So far global warming has only been a benefit to the world, not a disadvantage, so again i see little reason to fear the end of the world as some scientists would have you believe. Weve seen enough end of of the world shit to know it is not real, and global warming scientists are no exception. Their methods are not accurate, and their predictions thusfar have proven to be false. I cannot trust a body of science with such a low level of success in proving these things. The worlds getting warmer, but long term predictions are out of reach for our scientists today. There is more than enough scientific evidence to prove that.
EDIT: And I have always been an evironmentalist as far as realizing how much we polute. Global warming is one kind of pollution, the one I am least worried about. The idea that there will be no ice on earth and billions of people will be displaced is still bullshit fi you ask me. I need to see some of these climate predictions come true first, so far they keep having to retract their statement because their near term predictions have been wrong several times. So not very confident in their long term predictions.
The warming trend I agree with, but what it means to me is different from what you all have been told to believe.Comment
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Whoa roo! did I piss you off at another time and you were just waiting to jump my shit? J/k that post was hilarious........ But anyways I don't think money has to do with it. For some reason usually unions, wally world doesn't set up shop in cities. Believe you me chicagoland has costs even in the suburbs that will put most cities to shame. ask PP..... I know for a fact there's a wally world within 10 mins of PP's crib and that aint the ghetto. Same thing goes for barrington, st.Charles and countless other "rich" areas around here.......Comment
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It's the mentality of things that needs to change. The mentality of not only us common folk, but the ones that are calling the shots too. There are so many things that speak to consumerism. One of the ones I have a big problem with is if you buy that tool for $4.99 instead of $6.99 you are told that you are "saving money." WTF is that? The only way you can save money is to go to the bank and even that's debatable. Maybe keep it in a box in the closet...don't nobody break into my house now. People don't save the money...they change even that notion in their mind and believe that they can get even more shit with that paycheck. Then they buy more shit. It's the want vs. need battle. I use it in selling kitchens and it works but it's a terrible thing. I do take solace in the fact that we are a US manufacturer w/ US parts but it doesn't resonate with most people. They're (the customers) just concerned with how much they can get for how little. They've been taught that that's how to think. It's sick.
We are told that we deserve it in a round about way. People of my generation (I'm 36) want to live like our parents live. We want to drive the Caddy, or Lexus. We want the granite countertop. We want to go on a nice vacation every year. Then we have lenders that say...yes. You can have all of that. You should have all of that. Then we're told that we can't loose w/ real estate. Well, if you believed that one I've got a bridge to sell you. Think back to when you were a kid. What did you have to play with? For me it was sticks, balls, and bikes. My mom made me collect money for Jerry's kids to get my first bike. She spun it as if she was teaching me something (and she really did) but the real reason was that they couldn't afford one...then again they couldn't go down to the local Wal-Mart and get one for $59.00. Today we have SOOOOO much shit. And it really is shit. My kids are young and we have to often tell people not to bring a gift for the kids when the come over to visit. They reject that and think that it's wrong. Dudes, I have three boxes of unopened toys in my cellar. I could probably go two Christmases w/o buying a single thing for the kids. But why do people buy these gifts in the first place? 'Cos they're cheap and then they (or perhaps the kids) begin to learn that material things equal love and affection...admiration and just plain being nice. It's not like they don't have stuff either. There's a room FULL of toys. Most of them get played with but it's stimulus overload...thank God most of them don't require batteries. Those toys always bothered me for the sheer consumption factor.Comment
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Dont even start with kids toys! My house looks like a daycare center for 40+ kids and we only have one.Originally posted by WickedKitchen View Post
When I think of "over consumerism", that giant sludge of plastic junk floating in the ocean comes to mind.
We are going to drown in our own sh#t!Comment
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Your place sounds like ours...Originally posted by WickedKitchen View Post
Our older son has received so many toys for birthdays, Christmas, etc that we have piles of unopened gifts in our basement, garage, my parents' basement... stuff that's been collecting since he was 3 or 4 (he is now 5). I've been trying to convince my wife to just re-gift them to our younger son, but we still end up with boxes of new toys coming into the house.
Same situation with clothes. Boxes and boxes of clothes our older has outgrown, but since he was born in spring and the younger was born in late summer, she still buys new because apparently he is the wrong size for the seasonal stuff. I tried calling bullsh*t because he is wearing older brother's winter coats and jackets, but I think she just likes to buy stuff.
Aided and abbetted by her mother, who apparently thinks it's great to buy stuff for her grandchildren. Helping to raise yet another generation who thinks they are 'entitled' to everything they want, when they want it....
Frustrates me to no end.Comment
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Originally posted by kreigle View Post
Lol, that's the same with my wife. She goes shopping like every weekend and i'm like "doesn't the baby have enough shoes and clothes?" And she is like "no, she has no shoes, and none of her clothes fit!" and i'm like lol yah except for the 3 dressers full of clothes. If they don't fit anymore than let's throw it all out?
And her mom is much more wealthy than my family so she'll buy her like $300 worth of clothes at a time and then my mom feels bad because she feels like when she buys an outfit or two it doesn't mean anything. My parents saved all of my toys and that equals about 5 boxes of toys. For my entire childhood... My daughter isn't even two yet and we have a garage filled with them lol.Comment
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Too bad you can't send the toys back for a refund or even store credit. I have donated some of them to toys for tots and given some to other kids, but we still have a ton of them.
My wife is a shopper too. She's fairly frugal though so I don't complain. Most of her shopping is a yard sales or consignment shops so the stuff is pretty cheap that she comes home with. Some of it looks like it's old as the hills but those are great places for kids shoes and coats that they'll only fit in for one season. We really haven't bought too many clothes for them as we got hand-me-downs from friends. The girls aren't yet at the age where they need the newest and greatest thing and I hope that continues...
I like buying used stuff. Anyone else here do that? I do for just about everything except for clothes and good cooking pans and knives.Comment
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Originally posted by WickedKitchen View Post
I attempt to buy everything I can used at all times. I check the craigslist app on my phone every day for deals. My last two places were all stuff I got second or third hand from craigslist, and my apartment before that was funished in full by stuff people leave out by the dumpster, no joke. The idea that everything needs to be new is false. I bought a 50" plasma TV for $300 and its been great. All my other tv's were scond hand as well. My mom is the "buy new" type, so she had to settle with a 35" TV for $300. No reason not to have the best at a cheaper price.
But you do always take a risk with buying anything that has moving parts second hand, like electronics. But i havn't had trouble so far.Comment
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I feel quite sure that if we did not have this insane cornucopia of choice in every conceivable product category that we'd all be whining about that and spotting conspiracies in every corner to blame for the situation. There appears to be little practical middle ground between the rampant consumerism of semi-laissez-faire capitalism and the stunted and grim realities of socialist command economies. It's like the old crack about democracy. Capitalism is the worst possible system of economics--except for all the others. We're humans. We're imperfect. All our works are imperfect. Neither we, our works, or our philosophies are perfectible although we often obsessively chase that perfection to its asymptotic extremities. It is instructive to remember that better is the enemy of good enough and perfect is the arch foe of both. And yeah I'm poor and I shop at Walmart. I don't have the time much less the luxury of garment-rending raging against the inequities of globalization when what I need right this minute is a blasted quart of milk and, a pound of butter, and a bag of coffee--for about half what those would cost at Whole Foods.Comment
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I just wanted to reiterate that I don't think it's shameful by any means to shop at Walmart. I think it's sad their model has forced other family or at least locally-owned options out of business, and forced its target demographic into their aisles making the Walton family even absurdly richer at the expense of local economies in "Flyoverville, USA", to borrow from Darwin.
Whole Foods is equally ridiculous, not in its business model or effect on local economies necessarily, but because they are able to so successfully convince people that it's worthwhile to pay several times the wholesale value of most of the shit they are selling and fork over stacks of $20's for 2 reasons: 1) because it is supposedly of higher quality (which can't be denied in the case of produce, meats, and such compared to Safeway/Kroger and I assume, Walmart, but definitely does not apply to most of their crap. You can get that shit at all kinds of places like farmer's markets, quality small businesses like butchers and mom-and-pop shops, at way more reasonable prices And 2), because it represents a higher rung on the social and intellectual ladder to some people; they feel as though they are being "responsible" in some way, be it environmentally, nutritionally, or culturally, if you are part some yuppy/hippy-ish crowd that overpopulates large cities.
I say all this because a few people I have a lot of respect for on the forum have spoken up in defense of shopping at Walmart since I went on my little Walmart rant. As I mentioned in a "local food" thread, I have 3 goddamn Whole Foods within 5 minute's drive, one of which is on my way home from work, so yeah I stop in there from time to time because they sell St. Bernardus Abby 12 and Trippel Ales in big $12 bottles, and those beers have a very special place in my heart which I satisfy once a month or so. And like I was trying to say in my original post in this thread, just because the nearest Walmart is probably 30 minutes from here (I have no idea), all the crap I wear comes from the same factories, albeit often times under different standards of quality control, durability, and materials used, depending on the brand.
A good example are the pants I'm wearing -- I bought 2 pairs at a factory outlet store on the coast for $35 a pair. They are durable, "workman" pants, like Carharts without hammer loops. They are sold by and manufactured for Eddie Bauer, a Seattle company. They are manufactured in India, at a factory that makes garments for a subcontracted manufacturing firm who has hundreds of clients. I'm not sure about the garment workings in India and Bangladesh -- my family history and knowledge on the matter is based on East Asian manufacturing. My father has been in charge of shoe production since 1975 first with Nike, then Adidas, then Diadora, Puma, and now Columbia Sportswear. Nike (when it was called Blue Ribbon Sports) used to make shoes in New Hampshire. Then they were approached by a Japanese company and moved manufacturing there. Within only a few years, Korean and Taiwanese manufacturing firms sprouted up, and by the late 70's Nikes were being made in those countries. I was conceived in Taipei and born in Seoul in 1978 for this reason. The Taiwanese and S. Koreans still ran and still do in many cases run the show in terms of manufacturing the world's goods, but with the introduction of the Deng Xiaoping's economic policies in the 80's, designating some of China's ports as Special Economic Zones (read Capitalist and intended to bring in foreign investment), the Taiwanese and Korean manufacturing firms suddenly had access to such a tremendously cheap, exploitable, and expendable labor pool. Along with rock-bottom wages, tax breaks from the Chinese Government for setting up in these new zones, and the know-how and infrastructure make and distribute the goods, they easily enticed the international or transnational corporations into shifting production to China. On a personal note, that happened after I moved back to the USA and my interest in China has nothing to do with all that. I know plenty of people through my father who could get me jobs in shit-hole factory towns like Dongguan in the very south of China along the Pearl River -- where something like 80 percent of all toys and shoes are made. Now things like garments and soccer balls and you-name-it are moving where it's even cheaper.
Why am I ****ing lecturing on the globalization of manufacturing? lol. I guess because it has really influenced my life and had a direct impact on my formative years as a kid, and I want you Walmart shoppers to understand that I do not criticize you for buying the least expensive necessities possible from the cheapest retailer. That is the philosophy that drives manufacturing and production and ultimately consumerism, and it really is a race to the bottom, and a reality we all face, not to mention the very source of many of this countries economic problems. By that I don't mean our decision to shop there, I mean the fact that it's the only viable option in the first place. How could it have been done differently? How could we have avoided moving these essential functions of the supply and demand chain in more profitable directions and to more cost-saving places as true capitalists? How coould we have avoided these dire consequences to or workforce, our dollar, etc. I don't have the answers.
I dig lxskllr's idea of buying used whenever possible. I could say were all are guilty of perpetuating the problem, but that is not the case and not fair to any of us. We are not guilty. We are trying to figure out how to deal with the inevitable. I'll quit now and go eat some dinner. Weisswurst, kraut, broccoli, and a spinach salad. Crazy to think about the chain of events and people involved in even putting this food on my table, let alone the clothes I am wearing. Sorry to ramble. Bottoms up.Comment
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Well I do live in a town big enough to have plenty of choices price-range wise but I don't have the option of spending very much for necessities so Wally World usually gets the nod unless they simply don't have what I want or a specific product that I need. In the final analysis my parlous financial condition is about 98% my fault and largely my bad. Consequently until things improve Mr. Walton's devil-child will have to suffice. If my income hadn't been reduced by about two-thirds in the last few years my shopping habits would rarely include the Big Bad Box. C'est la vie or what the hell ever. My bad was picking for a career the newspaper bidness which is in the tank for reasons everyone knows all too well and which are at best only peripherally related to globalization. Still I'm hardly unaware of the alleged depradations of globalization but I'm also aware that in every way I can think of the "cure" for it would most likely be worse than the "disease". The Law of Unintended Consequences can never be repealed.Comment
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just for sgreger,
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Tuesday, September 27, 2011
First Ever GAO Audit Of The Federal Reserve
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TEC ^ |
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IMF Warns U.S. Debt Nears 100 Percent of GDP, Greece In Better Shape
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