Wal-Mart Management Misconduct Derails Working Poor’s Gravy Train

“Wal-Mart employs 2.2 million people and runs more than 10,000 stores around the world”.  They also will locate in the poorest areas of a city becoming an anchor to keep that neighborhood afloat and providing jobs to those who need it worse.  Wal-Mart also allows those on fixed incomes or little income to be able to put food on their tables at a decent price as well as provide so many other basic necessities without breaking the bank.  It is also true that they are often targeted by labor and community activists who argue that it underpays its workers and its sprawling stores undercut smaller shops, often putting them out of business but Wal-Mart continues to go where other big box and chain stores refuse to tread.

Now it takes another tremendous hit and one that it may not be able to recover from.  According to Jessica Wohl and Carlyn Kolker of Reuters in their article titled Wal-Mart probe could cost some executives their jobs, it is reported that “the New York Times reported on Saturday that in September 2005, a senior Wal-Mart lawyer received an email from Sergio Cicero Zapata, a former executive at the company's largest foreign unit, Wal-Mart de Mexico, describing how the subsidiary had paid bribes to obtain permits to build stores in the country.  Wal-Mart sent investigators to Mexico City and found a paper trail of hundreds of suspect payments totaling more than $24 million, but the company's leaders shut down the investigation and neglected to notify U.S. or Mexican law enforcement officials.  Legal and retail experts said that the allegations, if proven true, could badly hamper the company and its management for years. They could lead to a time-consuming global probe, substantial financial penalties paid to U.S. authorities, and the departure of some executives.”

While all that is bad, I still say that the worst thing that could happen is Wal-Mart stops its expansions into poor neighborhoods and decides to shut down those stores in order to pay any and all fines and penalties.  All because those who investigated had their brains go on vacation and tried to cover this up.  It is not known when it will become clear to every executive that anything you do in the dark will come to the light so make sure when it does, it cannot do any damage.  Wal-Mart is often times the only link that the working poor have to making it into the middle class or a chance to create a better life for their families.  Executives need to learn that decisions made by them do not affect only them.  Their hiccups cause’s chest pains for so many more.  They should be held accountable for causing this mess but should also be accountable for those who may suffer long-term like the employees, and communities.  Those executives will probably still get their bonuses and land another six figure salary job later on but the workers and communities may never be the same.