Walmart's Misdeeds Round Up

How's about a quick round up of Wal-Mart's latest and lamest?

Walmart Defends Sick Leave Policy Despite H1N1 Fears - basically, if you are sick and stay home then Wal-Mart will dock you a vacation day or just not pay you for your first day of being sick. Why yes, Wal-Mart does sound alot like a corporatized Ebeneezer Scrooge.

Walmart Will Pay Up To $85 Million To Settle Workers' Suit - until these lawsuits invert Wal-Mart's profit making, Wal-Mart will not change its ways. That is, the penalties are far less than what Wal-Mart earned by exploiting its workers. Make them lose money and the practice will stop. Pretty simple really.

That's about it for now, I'm sure I've missed other recent judgments against the exploitation behemoth but I had to do some cold Mark All Read cleaning out of my Google Reader feeds, it had become too stuff full. I'll get back on the Wal-Mart is Pure Evil bandwagon soon enough. Until then, shop anywhere but Wal-Mart if you possibly can. Supporting Wal-Mart is condoning their behaviour and abuse of workers, suppliers and localities they infest with their Big Box hell holes.

Another Drop in the Bucket Loss for Wal-Mart Wage Exploitation

Wal-Mart to pay up to $54 million to settle wage suit

At what point does the Justice Department look at these many and repeated lawsuits of Wal-Mart's wage exploitation and finally step in and say these are not isolated incidents. Wal-Mart has a corporate philosophy of squeezing its least powerful employees for extra work. Nobody likes being squeezed and, eventually, the squeezees will fight back and win yet another judgment.

Spend your money at Wal-Mart? Then you are supporting an exploitative company that crosses the line so often that it knows the border guards by name and how well their kids did in school this last semester.

Wal-Mart cares not the least about the law, they care about their bottomline regardless. And that is despicable.

Lawsuits, Fines and Exploitation, Oh My!

Here's a quick round up of news.

From Minnesota: Hastings residents involved in lawsuit against Wal-Mart - more illegal wage shaving and abuse.

From California: Air board fines Wal-Mart $250,000 for noncompliant gas cans for the fourth time in the last few years.

From New York: Wal-Mart vigil protests wages, health benefits in that, this is a company that makes billions of dollars per year but refuses to pay for health care for its workers.

From Arizona: Group: Ornaments made in sweatshop in China, naturally. The National Labor Committiee said employees included children who were forced to work 16-hour shifts and were paid below the Chinese minimum wage.

Tags: Wal-Mart, WalMart, lawsuit, wage+abuse, healthcare

Wal-Mart Doesn't Want Employees to Pee On or Off the Clock

Wal-Mart's labour practices face trial yet again

In the Minnesota case, as in 30 other attempted or successful class actions around the country, plaintiffs say Wal-Mart knowingly hired too few people to do too much work. To fill the gap, managers pushed hourly workers to skip a lunch here, a rest break there, and sometimes stay a few minutes after clocking out, the lawsuits claim. Basic human functions took a back seat to the work, the workers say.

and there's this rationalization.

Shaving one-tenth of 1% off Wal-Mart’s payroll would save the company $138 million, Wal-Mart’s then-chief executive officer, David Glass, said in 2001 while exhorting managers to cut back on labour costs, the Minnesota plaintiffs’ lawyer, Justin Perl, said in opening statements.

Tags: Wal-Mart, WalMart, class action, lawsuit, exploitation

Cascading Lawsuits

Philadelphia verdict against Wal-Mart good for KC plaintiffs

A win in one part of the country can invoke more wins in other, similarly jurisdicted, areas. The suit in Kansas City has many similarities to the Philly lawsuit (posted here that saw not one but two awards handed down, seperately but to the same plaintiffs.

Tags: Wal-Mart, WalMart, cascading lawsuits, Kansas City, Philadelphia

Always Big Settlements. Always

Wal-Mart Workers Win $62 Million for Off-the-Clock Labor

Sure, it breaks down to a mere $500 per worker they abused. But its the second settlement they've now won and the door has been kicked wide open for other lawsuits based on Wal-Mart's unquestionably unethical and illegal practice of making employees work through breaks and off the clock without pay.

There are almost undoubtedly more lawsuits in the wings.

Tags: Wal-Mart, WalMart, lawsuit, off-the-clock, worker abuse

Wal-Mart Lawsuit Exposes Widespread Worker Abuse

Ex-Workers Bring Class Action Lawsuit Against Wal-mart

After months of being denied breaks, Debbie Simonson had had enough. She quit her job at the Brooklyn Park Wal-Mart store because "I was tired of all the stress . . . of being told I couldn't go to the bathroom."
Even though she didn't get to take the breaks, Wal-Mart never paid her for the time she worked, she said.

Then, on one of her last days of work, Simonson forgot to punch the time clock at the end of her shift. So a supervisor marked the log for 6:59 a.m. – one minute after she started. Instead of getting paid for eight hours of work, she was paid for one minute.

The article ends with the cheery thought that, despite the mounting coverage of Wal-Mart's exploits, the abuse of the workers continues unabated and unabashedly.

Tags: Wal-Mart, WalMart, lawsuit, worker abuse, one minute punch