Walmart workers plan Black Friday protests

(CBS News) This Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, is one of the biggest shopping days of the year. At Walmart, signs advertising sales may be competing this year with signs carried by unhappy employees on protest lines.

Dozens of Walmart workers protested outside a store near Washington, D.C., Monday. Hundreds of similar pickets are planned at Walmart stores and warehouses across the country.

Dan Hindman has worked at a Walmart near Los Angeles for four years. The former employee of the month, who makes $9.80 an hour, says he is scheduled to work on Black Friday but does not plan to show up.

"Walmart needs to learn that it's not fair how they treat us," Hindman says.

The protesters want minimum hourly pay raised to $13, more full-time work and less-costly health care. Next year, their insurance premiums will jump by as much as 36 percent, as Walmart scales back its contribution.

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"We don't want to walk out on Black Friday. We don't want to do this. It's just something we have to do, because it's the right thing to do," Hindman says.

He says his schedule was cut to 15 hours per week when he joined a group of Walmart employees who favor unionizing. He lost custody of his four-year-old son when he could no longer support him.

"So I lost my son and I'm kind of regretting working for Walmart, but I have to provide, you know?" says an emotional Hindman. "It's the biggest retailer in the world, and you can't help me provide for my son? It kills me, dude. It really tears me apart, big time."

Walmart tried to head off large-scale protests with a complaint to the National Labor Relations Board. The company says the demonstrations are being orchestrated by outside unions.

"This is just another union publicity stunt, and the numbers they are talking about are grossly exaggerated," says Walmart Vice President David Tovar. "If associates are scheduled to work on Black Friday, we expect them to show up and to do their job, and if they don't, depending on the circumstances, there could be consequences."

Walmart has successfully blocked several attempts by outside groups to unionize its 1.3 million workers in the U.S. It isn't clear whether the employees protesting this week are trying to form a union or simply shame Walmart on the biggest shopping day of the year.

[TimeToEvolve]

I am happy about Thanksgiving that we turned back the red scare (although many clueless states need to purge their state governments of the failed and obsolete Republicon Party). And that most of us are so, so much better off that 4 years ago.

But it is so sad that the America Sheeple have let giant corporations like Mall Wart convince us that shopping and consuming and destroying the planet is somehow patriotic. All I see are ignorant, frantic and shallow shoppers running around like headless chickens to consume while the Top 1% go laughing all the way to their (offshore) banks. While we fry the planet. It is Time to Evolve. Or go the way of the Dodo bird.

[drpsarcasm]

http://wfnt.com/should-walmart-be-open-on-thanksgiving-dan-on-the-street/

[TimeToEvolve]

At the very least this should focus attention on the fact that Wal Mart has abandoned America as far as where their allegiance lies. And that shopping there harms America on so many different levels.

[TimeToEvolve]

As the unions go so goes the pay of the entire middle class, that is historical fact. And if corporations like Wal Mart want a race-to-the-bottom society they need to provide proper profit sharing so that families have health care and a decent standard of living. Otherwise they need to pay their fair share so the government can do it. That's their only two choices.

[hillzhaveays]

If you are working in an unskilled hourly position, you are not the Middle Class.

If you expect to be Middle Class working an unskilled hourly position, stop reading pamphlets handed out by the United Socialist Worker's Party and check back in to reality.

Time, face it. You do not reflect the majority of Americans. I don't even think you know what profit sharing is, judging by the way you reference it in this post. As usual, you just make things up talking about things you know nothing about, other than what you've read in USWP pamphlet's. Sometimes, I think you learned everything you know about the world in those pamphlets.

[hillzhaveays]

by ugacrew November 21, 2012 12:45 AM EST
Cold hearted. Every man deserves fair pay and decent wages for his honest work. No man should have to have a college degree at all to be paid fairly for what he does.
_______________________________________

Fair? $12-13/hr is more than enough for someone who stocks shelves, sweeps the floor or stands behind a counter.

If you want more out of life, don't trudge through it punching a time chit. Study hard, stay in school and educate yourself - then don't expect a free lunch, go out and get after it. You are responsible for your own life and your own success. Not the government.

You socialists are intent on growing a nation of deadbeats. I've seen the people at Walmart. No way would I hire them.

[MurdochSucks]

I don't know why anybody would choose to work at WalMart. Oh, because the chain store came in and underbid all the other businesses in the area putting all of the other retail chains out of business. WalMart is the quintessential problem with modern Laissez-faire Capitalism. It is the reason we have anti-trust law in any case. We need to shut them down, at least in the US. They are bad for communities, bad for society, bad for the US. I'm not talking about the Government coming in and taking over; I mean the potential customers should look elsewhere and perhaps pay a couple extra pennies. It cost the taxpayers of the states that WalMart is in too much to subsidize their health care. WalMart corporate even has a program to teach/instruct its employees on how to get benefits from the state so they don't have to pay for them. So, think about that when you are all excited about saving 2 pennies on your Chinese-made junk knockoffs. We are saving at their extorting registers, but we pay WAY more in the end to support their employees. WalMart makes big profits from our taxpayer subsidized health care for their employees. With the Affordable Care Act, that should change.

On the other hand, I agree with you, $9/hr (what the subject of the article makes, not near $12-13) is a decent wage for unskilled labor.

[latin_macho]

The day of Thanksgiving is a holiday for all Americans, walmart should reconsider and leave their workers continue the family tradition of celebrating this day.
http://www.topworldimages.com/Walmart.htm

[HistoryNote]

I visited a new Walmart "Neighborhood" (scaled-down version) tonight on my way home from work. I've been there half a dozen times since they opened. Each time I've notice an obvious "chip on the shoulder" of the employees. I don't know if they are simply not aware, or what, but we - the shoppers can hear them as they complain to loudly within the isles.

Tonight there was only one checkout lane open. I managed to get in line before that lane closed. The clerk had a dour attitude. When another person, several behind me, attempted to join the queue, the clerk barked "lanes closed". Everyone in line looked at each other. There was no other open line - other than self checkout.

And it's rather dimly lit. Inside the store and outside. When I first visited, it was brightly lit inside. Last week there was a crew doing something with the lights. Now you almost need a flashlight. And the parking lot lights are so dim - you wonder why they even bothered to turn them on.

As I left, I noticed a spent whiskey bottle discarded into the planter outside the door. The store is located in a rather upscale neighborhood, where you rarely see whiskey bottles laying around. And no, the store doesn't sell whiskey.

Directly across the street is an upscale version of the same type of store. It cost about 40% more for the same items. Everything is brightly lit, and you can leave without the feeling of having bothered the employees by shopping there.

None the less, Walmart has better prices, so I'll endure the experience, when I can.

[TimeToEvolve]

In fact as the unions go so goes the pay of ALL Americans. Reagan knew that when he declared war on workers as part of his work for the Wall Street barons.

Since Reagan the pay of the unions and thus the middle class has remained the same. Meanwhile the pay of the barons has gone through the roof. Mission Accomplished.

[hillzhaveays]

So evidently the election (and of course a little face time with the big man in Washington last week) has emboldened the unions. You've got Walmart and LAX, what next?

Frankly, if you are an adult and you aren't making more than $13 an hour that's not the fault of the company you work for. It's your fault for not learning a skill or doing well in school. Hold yourself accountable for your place in life. Quit shifting blame to others. If you don't have enough hours, get a second job and quit crying about it.

I have 0 sympathy for these people.

[TimeToEvolve]

If you are not rich and you do not have a job blame yo'self - Herman Cain, 2012

[ugacrew]

Cold hearted. Every man deserves fair pay and decent wages for his honest work. No man should have to have a college degree at all to be paid fairly for what he does.

You say you have 0 sympathy for these people, imagine, if the person that bagged your groceries had a college degree then you would pay a whole lot more to have your groceries bagged. People would figure they deserved much higher pay because of their degree too and guess what? They would have 0 sympathy for you.

[TimeToEvolve]

The first mistake that Americans made is somehow trusting the greedy Wall Street corporations to do ANYTHING good or right. Their whole plot was to make America dependent on them and then they could literally do anything they want to us. And people are swallowing the corporate garbage hook line and sinker.