http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/americas/09/11/mexico.walmart.reut/index.html What's next? The Ebay.com Statue of Liberty? Walt Disney Inc presents: The Pyramids at Giza? What are your thoughts on this Wal Mart? Is there any defendable position they have?
damn. they tried to move into my neighborhood for like the past 6 months, and we've been protesting. they wouldn't move to a more suitable place across the road, because it would cost 2 more dollars per sqft. but we shut them out. :m:
This actually does not surprise me. If it attracts tourists, it is a potential source of money. Just a matter of time that big companies leech away the money of the tourists at that location. Alas, I think Wal Mart is a strange choice... a supermarket next to cultural/historical sights? Who needs that? I can understand a fast food restaurant or something like that. After all, people have to eat now and then. But a supermarket? I also do not think that it is a good idea to commercialise cultural sites like that, but I can tolerate locals who try to sell miniatures or whatever, which is probably the case anyway. But big commercial industries should be kept away, especially if their presence entails big and probably not asthetic buildings that look grossly out of place. As to Wal Mart´s defendable position, they have money and they will make more with this venture. That is what counts in this case. Better blame the Mexican government for this one.
and yeah, when a wal mart dies, they leave the corpse there, so no companies can fill in. also when another big box company tries to move in, they buy the lot and wont sell it. :m:
and walmart is going to die off in the future. i'd give it 20-30 years. because they make their money based upon rapid growth, eventually they will exceed their carrying capacity and die. :m:
WalMart is America's number one engine of offshore outsourcing. They do more business with China than all but a couple of the largest countries. When they enter into a contract with an American company, it's so big that they take over its entire production capacity. After letting some time pass during which the company's old customers fade away and find other suppliers, they start twisting the screws. When the contract is up for renewal they lower the wholesale price. Before long the company can't afford to make their products in America, they're losing money. So they have the choice of going out of business or going to China. What I don't understand (and I've said this before so some of you may be tired of hearing it) is what companies like Walmart expect to do when they've screwed the last American worker out of his job? Who's going to buy their products? Certainly not the Chinese workers who, while making a decent salary by Chinese standards, can't even dream about buying designer sneakers or a flat-screen TV. Sure there are some rich people in the new China, but not enough to replace 300 million Americans as the world's premiere consumers. I agree that WalMart and the other shameless job-exporters like EDS will eventually go belly-up, but it will be in synchronization with the entire country. Americans have become so stupid that even our business leaders can't foresee the consequences of their deeds. I suppose they've converted all of their money into other currencies and they'll simply emigrate when they've destroyed this country. I understand that Americans by nature are inventors and risk takers, not process improvers and quality monitors. Some industries become so mature that this is simply the wrong place for them. Automobiles, and soon software, if not already. But nobody's building up the new industries to take their place.
(Insert Title Here) I wonder if George Bush still wonders why so many people in the world are angry at, or even hate the United States and its people? On Edit: Didn't Disney try to build on a Civil War battle site a few years ago?
I know that McDonalds had/has a restaurant at one of the German concentration camp sites. I am not sure, but I think they were forced to remove it. But it is a fact that it was there. Very bad taste in my opinion. EDIT: It was in Dachau, and I think it might still be there. Have found no info that it was removed.
When money is the motivating force behind a society, everything is for sale. Change that, and this problem doesn't occur. Mexican nationalism: http://www.aztlan.net/
That is simply a cynical way of restating one of the basic facts about civilization: When communities become so large that most people are strangers to one another, and so large that division of labor and economies of scale become so efficient that a large surplus accrues; then a formal method will be developed for allocating that surplus fairly among the members of the community, and for ensuring that trades of portions of that surplus between one member and another are regarded as fair by both parties. That method requires units of measurement. They can be cows or well-crafted beads or ounces of gold or anything that is of fairly limited and stable supply. But eventually all civilizations hit upon the concept of money. An abstraction that stands for cows or beads or ounces of gold but is far easier to store and transfer. To say that money is the motivating force behind a society is to say that it has such an ample surplus that everyone can easily fulfill their basic needs. Life becomes about pursuing wants instead of needs. It is not money -- which is merely the mechanics of how a society expresses its wants -- that defines it so much as what those wants are. We sophisticated 21st century intellectuals believe that there is something noble about a society that directs its surplus into the production of art, the study of science, and the discussion of philosophy. And that there is something base about a society that directs its surplus into the production of art that we consider trivial, the study of science that reduces one's need to think and work, and the discussion of philosophy that approves of failure to secure a life as prosperous as one's own for one's descendants. The sophisticates of every era felt exactly the same way. And we of course think they were all correct.
...right... I think people get too attached to rocks. I mean just because its old does not mean its good. Look at the Eiffel tower, it is f'ed up and butt ugly, but since it has been around for a long time people like it. Well, now they like it; everyone hated it when it was first built. People are too sentimental! get over it!
I would presume that this is not necessarily about rocks, rather about the ethics of capitalism. A question of how far consumation and commercialism can go. And in my opinion, some rocks or old structures can have a historical and cultural aspect. But hey, everyone is entitled to his/her own views. After all, most artworks are also just pieces of canvas...
