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by bsder
2615 days ago
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> Walmart has a negative impact on local small businesses but is it made up for by making goods available at prices they would otherwise not be leading to increased purchasing power? I'm not going to let you assert this without challenge. First, durable goods are probably more expensive. For example, old lawnmowers lasted forever--WalMart ones die in a couple seasons. Second, if a big box store wipes out local jobs that pay better, how much do prices have to be reduced to make up for that? People at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder spend and have a very high economic multiplier for how much their money drives other money. You don't have to lose many decent jobs in a 50,000 person town if most of them are 2x to 3x multipliers to really cripple the economy. Third, is WalMart actually cheaper? Big box stores are really good at optimizing prices such that you get one great deal, but lose just a little on everything else. Normally, people put up with it because WalMart is the only choice or is a very convenient single stop. |
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The local hardware store sells the same or close to the same value engineered Chinese lawnmower using a B&S clone engine and a steel deck. Walmart sells it for $119 when it's in season and more than that the rest of the time (I wanna say $140ish but I'm not sure). The hardware store can't touch the sale price. I bought a lawnmower last summer so I'm very aware of what durable they cost at the various outlets. Old lawnmowers lasted forever because all the ones that are left are high end aluminum deck models that never got ridden hard and put away wet (which is why I got one of them for free on Craigslist instead of buying one). You see a similiar pattern with other durable goods. The model of big box stores is low margin, high volume. They sell some stuff that's value engineered to within an inch of it's life (a lot of the stuff at Harbor Freight comes to mind) but they don't generally engage in bait and switch. If they sold goods that always failed to live up to what people were expecting they wouldn't still be in business.
>Second.
Walmart by itself is not going to wipe out your town. If Walmart and the other big box stores wipe out the town it's because there was no real economic activity going on there and everyone else was just rent seeking to sap the money from the few parties engaged in actual economic activity (like a plumber that jacks up his rates when working on rental income properties in a tourist town). Nothing of value is lost in that case. Complaining that Walmart kills a town is like complaining that more automation kills a factory town, sure it might be technically true but if increased efficiency is a threat to your economic survival then you were already dead and just didn't know it.
>Third, is WalMart actually cheaper?
It's very, very rare that I find that they're not. On groceries their selection seems to be pretty poor but you can get staples pretty damn cheap. I grew up in a shithole where you always had to watch what you were paying or you could get screwed hard so I tend to really watch trends. Big box stores tend to have the cheapest prices broadly. Small businesses will occasionally have great prices on a few things but prices in general will be higher. The value add of small businesses is flexibility and service that is only workable at their scale, not pricing.