Found this from another thread. Really true?

Very skeptical.....

 

I also worked at Wal-Mart as a associate aka SLAVE. I had to cover 1/2 the store on my own no help aviable plus be the guy doing the haul outs to the cars for customers. Wal-Mart canned me while I was also on a medical leave for seizures simply because they felt I would be a safety risk never mind the fact that they were operating a store were the managers were not even certifed fork lift drivers and they were the ones training people.

 

I have no firsthand knowledge of Wal-Mart, but my stepmom works there as a cashier and I chatted on the CB with a driver for about an hour the other night. He had been with them for several months and was hired with 2 years experience. He told me that they were hiring right now in the Washington Courhouse, OH DC and, like every other company, they will make exceptions to the experience rule. He seemed to be thrilled and I didn't ask him exactly how much he was paid, but he did tell me that he couldn't believe how well he was compensated to drive a truck. He recommended to another driver that they stop by the WCH DC to fill out an app so you might check with your local DC.

As for the store workers, IMO, it's not a bad gig at all at least in this area. My stepmom has been there for a little over a year and she never made minimum wage. They don't even start you at minimum wage. She has received a few raises since starting there and makes $8.35 an hour to punch buttons on a cash register in a climate controlled environment. Not bad in an area that regularly pays factory and dock workers 8-9 bucks per hour to work long days in a shop with no A/C.

When the morons in this state felt last November that it was necessary for someone who chooses to work for minimum wage to make $6.85/hour instead of $5.15, Wal-Mart upped the ante and raised their payscale across the board. They don't even hire in at minimum wage. The starting pay here is $7.25 per hour. I've talked at length with my stepmom about this alleged slave labor and she has an entirely different opinion. She has never been asked to work off the clock and there have been several times when the store was busy and she wanted to skip her break to help out, but they forced her to take her breaks. I know several managers at Wal-Mart who are compensated very well for what they do and really have no problems raising a family on what they make.

My personal opinion, based entirely on secondhand knowledge, is that Wal-Mart appears to be an excellent company and great for the economy. It's a perfect example of the opportunity that exists in this country. Sure, some of the stuff they sell is imported junk, but you do get what you pay for. Anyone who chooses to side with the unions that are behind all of the attack ads and lawsuits is free to do so. You have options. You can buy all your cheap, imported junk (at a slightly higher price) from Kmart where the cashier makes $6.85 and hour. Of course, that is if you can find one in your neighborhood that's still open... :wink:

 

redsfan, a good movie to watch would be "THE HIGH COST OF LOW PRICES." It is a documentary about walmart and is very accurate.

When I was in training, one of the movies they showed us (about an hour long) was about unions, and how BAD THEY WERE! Since when are unions bad? Would it be that walmart would actually have to pay its workers a decent wage?

 

Oh goody...another show is about to start....

 

I respect your opinion, but I'll stand by mine that they do appear to pay a decent wage. As for the movie, it was often stated that both "Fahrenheit 9/11" and "An Inconvenient Truth" were good documentaries that were very accurate, but we all found out that both were chock full of lies and fabrications, didn't we? Just because the creators and people of the same beliefs tell us that they are accurate doesn't necessarily make it so. I'll take your word for it and skip the viewing myself, but thanks anyway.

There's nothing necessarily wrong with a company being anti-union either. I've seen several companies where banners are hanging that say "Proud To Be, Union Free!". I know several people who work for said companies and they have no problem with that. My opinion is that unions were started with all the best intentions, but in many cases somewhere along the line, things went dreadfully wrong.

With all that being said, I will tell you that I am now a union worker. Yup, a full-fledged, card carrying member of Teamsters Local 114. It was required at the new gig I've now been employed with for 3 months. The cat's outta the bag now. Let er fly CFM and feederfred! Now, I will add that I had no clue that this was a union job until I showed up for the interview and they "had" to tell me about it. Beforehand, I spoke to the recruiter twice and the safety director once and both neglected to inform me of this small detail. Why? Were they afraid I wouldn't be as interested? They certainly didn't sugarcoat anything else.

I will tell that based upon my experience so far, it would have gone in the "CON" column had I known beforehand. In my personal opinion, it is a total waste of the $100 initiation fee and 42 bucks/month that I have to pay. It is not a strong union at all (as most aren't anymore). There is absolutely no fear of there ever being a strike and they have allowed the company to make changes to the contract in mid-stream on more than one occasion. I make a decent (not great) wage and have decent (again not great) benefits more so because they are a good company rather than the fact that they allow the union to remain in place.

My opinion is that the shortage of good employees in today's market would benefit me just as much as the union does.

This is all, once again, just my 2 cents.

 

Strange, I thought the original post was regarding driving for Walmart? Everything I have ever read, and the few Walmart drivers I have talked to say it is good money and they are pretty happy. No job is perfect and this is no exception. Get down to the holidays and they are driving hard. You have to deal with corporate politics and rules. Welcome to the real world.

If your a driver you can do a lot worse than Walmart as far as a driving gig goes. Walmart does pay their drivers well and few will dispute that. The question is whether you qualify to get on with them. Most of the whining and complaining comes from those that don't qualify and couldn't get a driving job with them. :roll:

If you qualify and they have an opening go for it.

Longsnowsm

 

Did you ever wonder why their drivers make +$70K plus while everyone in the store makes just north of minimum wage? It's because Wal-Mart is worried that the Teamsters will organize the drivers. If a store organizes, they can just shut it down like they did up in Canada. But if the drivers organize, then Wal-Mart is in hot water because the drivers would support striking store workers by not crossing picket lines to deliver product. And that would bring the world's #1 retailer to the bargaining table pretty quickly.

Do you think for one second that if there was no threat of unions that Wal-Mart drivers would get paid what they do? Oh so all those high-paid drivers are crippling the company, right? WRONG! Wal-Mart earned something like $16 BILLION on sales of $345 BILLION.

The morale of the story is that if you have no bargaining power, you're going to get the bare minimum. That's exactly what happened in OTR after deregulation when the unions went away. I can't believe there's still drivers out there pulling for less than .45 cpm and living out of a truck for weeks on end, sitting at docks for no money - what a joke!! Linehaul drivers where I work make .53 cpm straight drop-n-hook and home everyday and weekend to their families. Why? Well now you know.

So there's your lesson on the value of unions brought to you by your good friend and fellow driver, ColdFrostyMug.

 

Then you should stop being a hypocrite and go back to non-union employment. Unions are only as strong as their members. And you don't sound like you have the backbone to last ten minutes during a strike. If you love Wal-Mart so much, you need to work there. My local (63) IS strong, because our members are not afraid. You are not a Teamster, just a "hanger on".....CFM did have it right. WalMart would pay it's drivers .20cpm if they thought they could do it and not be organized. It IS the fear of being organized that makes them create two classes of employees, the "haves" and the "have nots"...Oh and I can't wait until you actually NEED your business agent/stewards to save your rear end when you have a problem at your job. Perhaps then you will appreciate a union contract, but somehow I doubt it...

 

All of this fear talk that Walmart only pays drivers due to the threat of organizing sounds pretty hollow to me. There is nothing that would prevent them from shutting down their fleet overnight and contracting work out to the Swift/Werner/JB Hunts of the world.

So I seriously doubt they keep the wages up due to the threat. I imagine the only reason they keep their fleet is the service they need during critical times of the year for their business. If not I am pretty sure they could contract it out for a lot less than what it costs them to run their fleet.

Longsnowsm