Anti-Wal-Mart Effort Irresponsible
Consumers typically make retail buying decisions based on some combination of convenience, service and price. The success of Wal-Mart stores around the United States indicates that price often is the most important consideration.
Capitalism, though, can be rough around the edges. Opponents of Wal-Mart say the chain doesn’t pay workers a living wage, forces small, family operations out of business and hurts neighborhoods by increasing traffic.
That’s why a local activist and the food workers union are sponsoring a Spokane city initiative aimed at severely restricting development of such “big box” retail stores within city limits.
Their fears are somewhat justified. Wal-Mart stores have had a definite effect on hundreds of towns and cities around the country. But the stores would not succeed without consumer demand, and therein lies the biggest flaw in the reasoning of the Wal-Mart opponents: If you build it, they will come.
It should not be up to the city government to legislate whether a store can build, as long as the company complies with existing zoning and safety laws. An attempt to skew zoning laws by using size restrictions to block one particular company is simply irresponsible.
If such an ordinance passed, it could even backfire - the stores simply would be built just outside of city limits. That means city residents would have to drive farther and the sales-tax revenue from their purchases would go to county coffers instead of the city’s.
It’s true that to keep prices low, Wal-Mart pays low wages. But it’s also true that Wal-Mart must compete with other local employers. In other words, it will lose all of its best employees to Costco, Safeway or Target unless it pays a competitive wage. The union activists would be better off arguing for a better-educated work force than trying to abolish low-paying jobs.
It’s also true that Wal-Mart offers low prices because of bulk buying. That’s an advantage that forces a lot of “mom and pop” competitors out of business.
One can lament the passing of those uncompetitive businesses, but how is the situation any different from what happened after World War II, when large grocery store chains such as Safeway and Albertsons put neighborhood groceries out of business?
In fact, smaller, local grocery store chains such as Rosauers, Yoke’s and Tidymans have figured out a way to compete with the grocery giants.
They compete by providing good service and being in convenient locations. And they also manage to have competitive prices.
The anti-Wal-Mart initiative is a bad idea. It would be silly to send city residents to the county to spend their money. And the effort to save the “mom and pop” businesses wouldn’t work anyway. Unfortunately, those businesses that can’t figure out how to compete in a changing marketplace will simply go out of business. The good news about capitalism, however, is that someone else will figure out how to compete. And ultimately, the consumers will decide.