Jimmine Johnson
Hilary Hall
ENGL-101
February 11th 2014
The People’s Company In today’s global marketplace, corporations find themselves under intense scrutiny. In terms of retail companies, this can manifest itself in terms of labor relations and corporate responsibility. Such is the case for Wal-Mart Stores Inc. Some groups maintain the position that Wal-Mart is terrible for poor Americans, while others assert that they are a progressive success story. In the article Up Against Wal-Mart, Karen Olsson communicates that Wal-Mart is detrimental to its employees by being anti-union. She utilizes an expansive array of facts, quotes, and statistics to persuade readers that Wal-Mart has little concern for its employees or environment in which they operate. On the other hand, Sebastian Mallaby argues in his article Progressive Wal-Mart. Really. the pay, opportunities, and perks the company offers to its employees must serve its goal for long-term growth and profitability. He does this in a succinct, sometimes argumentative, fashion by rebuking specific attacks on the way in which they conduct business. Within their own writing styles, each author expresses different points of views regarding Wal-Mart’s healthcare policies, compensation plans, and its effects upon the communities and economies in which it operates. Many people are under the impression that employers are responsible for the healthcare cost of their employees. Mallaby argues that Wal-Mart improves access to healthcare by raising the real incomes of people who are its customers. Furthermore, the size of Wal-Mart allows it to influence prices throughout the retail industry. This, in turn affects all consumers within an economy. Regardless of where they shop, people are able to afford healthcare more easily than they otherwise could. In response to this stance, critics of Wal-Mart complain that