This excuse can be used to justify virtually any deplorable behavior by a corporation. "If _we_ don't cut prices by dumping waste directly into the river, another company will!" Costco competes head-to-head with Walmart on prices, and doesn't treat their employees like cattle.
And as someone who worked at WalMart for awhile, their lack of a union (Meijer and Kroger both required I have full weekend availability as a result of their union contract -- and I needed weekends free for my job at McDonald's) and the relative ease of being able to get a job there was a huge part in my own escape from poverty.
This isn't really true. Costco carries less than 4000 SKUs in its warehouses. Walmart carries 40000 SKUs. That's an order-of-magnitude difference.
Costco competes more with (Walmart's) Sams Club warehouse but based on my shopping, their product selections don't overlap. (E.g. Costco has high-end wine that Walmart/SC doesn't carry.)
To make Costco vs Walmart an apples-to-apples comparison, Costco would have to eliminate the $60 to $110 annual membership fees, allow any non-member to shop there, and add 45000 additional SKUs.
I don't know anyone who shops at both Walmart and Costco on a regular weekly basis. Their business structures attract very different shopper demographics.
They can't eliminate the annual fee either because it's literally less than their annual profit (well maybe not in this market but it was a few years ago). Their demographic is people with the financial 'ability' to think $100 ahead for a year, to whom they deliver goods at basically cost.
Walmart vs Costco is a complete myth. Costco operates where Walmart does very poorly.
It is interesting to see the numbers in this article ~$6B in subsidies, and then compare that to dividends/buybacks: oh, look $6B-$7B [1] not even including buybacks. That is a direct redistribution of wealth [edit] from bottom to the top.
[0] https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2015-walmart-union-survei... [1] http://www.vuru.co/analysis/WMT/dividendsBuybacks
But that's not true at all. Unions do not actually benefit all workers equally, they benefit senior workers more at the expense of the more junior workers. And because of Union wage requirements, many times the junior workers are pushed to supplement their income by working in other industries, by suppressing wages in other industries.
Unions have a lot of problems associated with them, you should talk to someone who is young and part of a union and see all the issues they have.
I once had a conversation with an actor who was claiming the huge benefits of actors union and how because of that she is able to afford to have healthcare. The problem with this conversation was that this was happening while she was talking my order at a restaurant where she worked to supplement her income. I mean that defeats the whole point of union, wouldn't it be better if she was able to work more number of hours on screen at a lower wage and increase her skill set rather than working as a waitress on the side?
Nearly all the union attempts to increase wages result in companies either dropping the number of employees they have or drop the number of hours they employ them for. Sadly only the younger or junior workers pay this cost. If you are an older union workers, then there are nothing but benefits for you.
But back to Walmart... sans unions, only a consumer boycott over morals would change anything, and if it didn't [0] happen yet [1], I feel like its not going to... or hopefully it'll boil over in a few years. Personally, I've shopped there twice in the past 10 years - which i guess means i'm stupid since i'm paying a tax for them regardless, but maybe that's cancelled out since i participate in the stock market getting those dividends? I'm confused easily on those things.
[0] http://www.ethicalconsumer.org/boycotts/boycottslist.aspx#w
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wal-Mart:_The_High_Cost_of_Low...
Costco has the membership fee, and they only sell in bulk, which are usually better quality and higher cost than Walmart items. If you can barely afford Wal Mart, you definitely can't afford Costco and aren't even comparing the two.
Costco also doesn't put its stores in low income areas, automatically selecting for higher income customers.
It's not a justification, no more than if you ask me to shoo away the flies from food and I said "but what's the point, some other fly is going to sit on it", I am not justifying it, I am merely pointing out the futility of your solution. The real solution would involve not having to constantly shoo away the flies.
Anyway, that well-documented boat sailed in the '90s, and now we have Amazon (and I think Amazon deliveries are a net good thing).
What really bugs me is that I have to subsidize low wages at walmart. If the US would just switch to guaranteed income or raise the minimum wage, walmart prices would go up something like 1%, but their employees would make at least 33% more. Then my taxes could be used for something useful, like education.
The Freedom Market™ zealots willfully ignore that Walmart destroys competition, with other people's money.
I do not mind mega corporations being anticompetitive. Sociopath is as sociopath does.
I do mind pretending that its a moral good.
I do mind that I (Jane Taxpayer) is paying the bill.