Worst U.S. corporations?

[flaja]

What 3 U.S. corporations do you think have had the most detrimental impact on American society?

For me it is:

1. Walmart
2. Home Depot
3. McDonald?s

But I am open to suggestions for the #3 slot. There may be a company that has been worse than McDonald?s.

[havasu]

Why Home Depot?

[blucher]

Really.........

Lowes is HD's twin except ours is too large to find things so I usually go to HD.

I should add that having a BILLION Chinese as trading partners beats the heck out of having a BILLION irritable Commies Commies & a Cold War. It costs us Trillions to lose the two we have. If Europe has trouble with Qaddafi without our help don't look to NATO.

[havasu]

I understand that Home Depot sometimes has poor lighting and help is scarce, but I sure wouldn't place them in the top three most detrimental impacts on American society.

[blucher]

One huge expense is American Justice at several levels. Lawyers aren't self policing. The TV ads all but beg you to call and accept a settlement with no regard to actual injury.

In Philly there was a bad city bus crash. Twenty people ran onto the bus to claim injury.

BP will suffer little real damage. Between insurance and wrist slaps they'll remain the "do it on the cheap" star of BIG OIL. It was BP that caused an Alaska tundra spill 20 years back. The plug that they were required to run through the pipely monthly hadn't been run in years. That's not justice. If corporations can be people I want corporationpeople in jail.

People should get compensated for real injury but the personal injury blood suckers can win awards that have no relevance to the harm done. I think we need mandatory arbitration and a lost fewer over burdened courts.

Let's END DRUG CRIME in America tomorrow. Legalize all of it. Prohibition has never worked from the first hookers to weed. It creates evil markets that drug lords live off off.

If you're a good parent your kids know which choices to make. If they make bad choices they hit the bridge abutment at 90. It's not the fault of the bridge abutment, weed, peer pressure or even being dirt poor. It's not a good parent's fault either.
I was a real good kid. I got in fights but only started one. I still drove a 390 Mercury up the Duryea Hillclimb track each school morning. Speeds over 100 were hit in the last straight stretch but it was the controlled slides through all the curves that fed the adrenaline.



For some reason that year (early 60's) Merc cornered like a sportscar. I've had a Triumph try to lose me through miles of alleys and Uturns without success.

My intended point is that I was raised as well as any and I was a good kid. I made a lot of good choices because I'd had parental guidance and religious structure. None of that prevents any of us from kid to old fogey from making some pretty dumb choices.

Cleaning up the legal mess helps medicine too. Doctors also failed to police their ranks. We need an outside board of medical oversight. If a party files a (proven) frivolous or false medical claim that's a mandatory first offense year in jail.

We can put a chunk of the money saved (overcrowded prisons - courts) into better drug dangers awareness for kids (and adults). Another chunk into helping those with a sincere desire to quit.

I'd just nationalize Pharmaceuticals. Universities are already doing much of the research. Over & over they get caught and settle "without admitting guilt". I'm not seeing any 4 hour erections.

but that's just me.

[flaja]

Originally Posted by havasu

I understand that Home Depot sometimes has poor lighting and help is scarce, but I sure wouldn't place them in the top three most detrimental impacts on American society.

Because, like Walmart Home Depot has engaged in predatory business practices and have thereby driven smaller (often locally owned) retailers out of the market. And now that most of the competition has been eliminated Home Depot's brand and product selection has decreased while consumer prices have increased and customer service is non-existent.

[havasu]

So basically what you are saying is that if someone builds a better mousetrap for a cheaper price, we should ignore it and continue to pay a higher rate, just because?

As Blucher stated, I point fault with lawyers and the ACLU, who are those who demand weights and exercise equipment for those in prison. Oh yeah, their color TV's, choice meals, and my favorite....conjugal visits!

Regarding the bus accident...I too was investigating a bus crash and watched video of 5 men who jumped ON the bus after the fender bender, and demanded ambulances for their severe neck/back pain.

[RedJeepXJ]

Originally Posted by havasu

So basically what you are saying is that if someone builds a better mousetrap for a cheaper price, we should ignore it and continue to pay a higher rate, just because?......

No, it's about stomping out competition then creating the lousiest mousetraps and selling them for a fortune but always being willing to undercut any competition that tries to spring up and once they die then raise prices.

Big companies can also externalize far more costs through political means of gaining special tax statuses that little companies cannot, And without federal regulation of this no one can even pretend to be able to compete with amazon for instance since the states they locate factories in give huge tax breaks, pay for training of the workers, etc...

And I know federal regulation is evil but this is a situation that no state will be able to solve individually

[flaja]

Originally Posted by RedJeepXJ

No, it's about stomping out competition then creating the lousiest mousetraps and selling them for a fortune but always being willing to undercut any competition that tries to spring up and once they die then raise prices.

Big companies can also externalize far more costs through political means of gaining special tax statuses that little companies cannot, And without federal regulation of this no one can even pretend to be able to compete with amazon for instance since the states they locate factories in give huge tax breaks, pay for training of the workers, etc...

And I know federal regulation is evil but this is a situation that no state will be able to solve individually

You cannot explain it to the radical lib(ertarian)s. The truth is completely beyond their comprehension. They think that as long as someone is maximizing their immediate profit, regardless of what they do to society, all?s right with the world,

Predatory capitalism has been around for as long as capitalism itself has. Human nature means that people, when left to their own devices, will lie, steal, cheat and kill, sack, maim, pillage and destroy in order to make a profit.

I find libertarians to be grossly disingenuous and blatantly dishonest when they complain about tyranny from Pennsylvania Avenue and then see nothing wrong with tyranny from Wall Street when Wall Street has more control over our daily lives than the federal government does.

Think for a moment; who has more control over your daily life- the federal government or Walmart?

Ecology is the branch of biology that studies the interrelationship between living things and their environment from the individual to the ecosystem to the entire biosphere of planet earth.

I think we should borrow the ecological concept of buffering and apply it to politics when it comes to economic matters.

A large ecosystem that has many individual organisms and many different species of organisms is buffered. This means that a single disruption in any part of the ecosystem will not have a major effect on the rest of the ecosystem. If species A can only eat species B, anything that disrupts species B could have catastrophic effects on species A. At the same time if an ecosystem has only 1 population of species A, then the least little thing that affects that population could devastate the entire species. But if species A can eat species B, C and D, species A will have a better chance of survival should anything happen to either one of species B, C or D. And having several different populations of species A will make that species? long-term survival in the ecosystem more likely.

If we replace species with business, then we can apply the concept of buffering to the economy. For example, the U.S. has only 3 U.S. owned (or is it 2- I don?t know about Chrysler at the moment) auto manufacturers. This means that if any one of these manufacturers has a problem the entire U.S. auto industry is threatened. The more manufacturers we have the less likely a disruption with any one of them will be catastrophic to the economy. In the same vein the more auto manufacturers we have the more consumer choice there is (we wouldn?t all have to ride around in trucks and SUVs because that is what the big 3 tell us we can buy) and the more chance auto workers displaced from one company will have to find work in the same industry.

The history of retail trade where I have lived for all but a few of my 43 years (now a retail market of over 800,000 people) aptly reflects the results of letting a single economic species come to dominate an ecosystem.

5 Stores: Here when I was born in 1968, but out of business before Wal-Mart first opened here in 1987 (stores that I am aware of; there may be others that I am too young to remember):

Grants

J M Fields

Woolco

Sun Discount

Atlantic Mills

9 Stores: Not here when Wal-Mart opened, entered market after Wal-Mart opened but now out of business:

Phar-mor

Drug Emporium

Luria?s

Everything?s $1

Circuit City

Hollywood Video

Uptons

Mervyns

Blockbuser

15 Stores: Here before Wal-Mart opened but now out of business:

Montgomery Ward?s (Originally a Sears-type store but it became Jefferson Ward?s, a Kmart-type store just before Walmart opened then it left the market and later returned as a JC Penny-type store and then left again. The Swiss Colony now owns the name but it does not operate as a brick-and-mortar store anymore)

Pic-n-Save

Zayer?s/Ames

Standard Sales/Leeds/Service Merchandise

Diana Shop, Strawberry Fields, Jean Nicole (shared a parent company)

Western Auto

TG&Y, McCrory, Murphy?s/Murphy?s Mart (shared a parent company)

Revco

Coconuts Tapes and Records/Coconuts

Standard Brands (appliance store)

Woolworth

Count Sears/Kmart count as loss of 1 store due to merger

2 stores: Here before Wal-Mart opened, closed then reopened and closed again:

Jefferson Ward?s/Montgomery Ward?s

Linens n Things

16 Stores: Entered the market after Wal-Mart opened and still open:

Big Lots (operates under the dame Odd Lots and McFrugal in other parts of the country; has fewer stores now than it had at its height)

Dollar Tree

Target

Best Buy

HH Gregg

Kohl?s

Bell?s/Bell?s outlet

Auto Zone~

Pep Boys~

Advanced Auto Parts~

Sports Authority# (closed 1 of its only 2 local stores in 2010)

Gander Mountain# (has only 1 store)

Dick?s Sporting Goods# (has only 2 stores)

Pet Supermarket (1 store)

Petsmart

Petco (2 stores)

6 Stores: Here when Wal-Mart opened and still here:
Sears/Kmart

Wallgreens

Eckerd?s Drugs/CVS

JC Penney?s

Family Dollar

Eagle Dollar/Dollar General

3 Stores: Specialty stores (compete with Wal-Mart in a limited number of product categories) that have opened since the 1st Wal-Mart and still open:

Michael?s Craft and Decorating

A.C. More (only 1 store)

Garden Ridge (only 1 local location, but next to a locally owned craft supply store that closed in 2009 after being in business for 30 years or more)

Bed Bath and Beyond

4 Stores: Specialty stores open before Wal-Mart but now closed:
Old America Store (general arts and craft and home d?cor)

Wacamaw (arts and craft, home d?cor, kitchenware).

Let?s Cook

Rolling Pin

2 Stores: Upscale stores, not direct competitors with Wal-Mart still present:
Ivey?s/Dillards

May Cohens/Maison Blanche/Gayfers/Belk

2 Stores: Upscale stores, not direct competitors with Wal-Mart out of business:
Furchgott?s

Jacobsen?s

# Stores like Zayer?s, Pic-n-Save and Western Auto sold guns and ammo. Both Gander Mountain and Sports Authority sell guns and ammo. But since Walmart no longer sells guns or ammo and Kmart stopped selling guns and ammo once it merged with Sears (I don?t know if Sears still sells guns or ammo), there has been a net loss of stores that sell guns and ammo in my local market since Walmart first opened.

~These stores have partially replaced Western Auto but because of their small size you would need one of each to match the size of a single Western Auto store. Because of that product and brand selections have diminished since Walmart came to town. Furthermore, Kmart has mostly done away with auto parts and has closed its auto service garage since the merger with Sears. Also, JC Penney?s has closed its only auto center in town.

[safetyguy60]

MTV, The internet, Hollywood stars becoming the ones who teach our kids morality, dishonesty among professionals, greed among the clergy, all of which has lead to a moral breakdown. A lot of people have said the President was wrong for not going to the ceremony for the police and instead played golf that day. What do most Americans do on Memorial Day? Attend Parades, ceremonies to honor the service of Veterans, or will they bar-b-que at local parties and back yards while drinking their best brew? When I was a kid we went to parades. Sure we had outings and picnics too, but first we gave respect to those who the holiday was designated for, the Veterans! Where will you be Monday?