COM 0032.020 2006-2008 - Laserfiche WebLink

Home

Murashige, Laura From: Mary Marvin Porter [islandeyesvideo@yahoo.com] P1;.., Sent: Wednesday, January 17, 2007 6:21 PM To: counciltestimony@co.hawaii.hi.us .~U7 ~fli~ 1~ $ Z~ Subject: Support of Resolution 21-07 r;-. Attachments: Supercenter opposition letter to council.rtf rQt~l'e~ I ~ - - ...y. Supercenter opposition letter Dear Council Staff, I am sending this resolution below as attachment done in TextEdit on my Apple computer. It is also RTF (Rich Text Format.) Because Yahoo does an odd squezing of emails I would much prefer you use the attachment that is all on one page. If you are not able to open the attachment, please call me at 982-9100 and I will send in another format that you could open. Mahalo, Mary Marvin Porter Aloha Council Members, I am submitting this testimony in support of Resolution 21-07 opposing Big Box Supercenters. The trend today is the spread of huge chains, resulting in the wiping out of small business everywhere, and often with it better paying jobs, better working conditions, the distinctiveness of local cultures and the money no longer stays in the local community. Wal-Mart has started adding grocery stores to their businesses. Sometimes resulting in stores the size of 4 football fields. Happy with low prices, Wal-Mart customers don't connect those prices to the demise of neighborhood stores, or the use of foreign suppliers to replace U.S. companies and the loss of many more jobs. Wal-Mart's astonishing success exacts a heavy price. By squeezing suppliers to cut wholesale costs, the company has hastened the flight of U.S. manufacturing jobs overseas. Today, it is the largest importer of Chinese-made products in the world. Charlie Kernaghan of the National Labor Committee reports, "In country after country, factories that produce for Wal-Mart are the worst," adding that the bottom- feeding labor policy of this one corporation "is actually lowering standards in China, slashing wages and benefits, imposing long mandatory-overtime shifts, while tolerating the arbitrary firing of workers who even dare to discuss factory conditions." Also Wal-Mart's penny-pinching extends to its own 1.2 million U.S. employees, no unions are allowed and by the company's own admission, a full-time worker might not be able to support a family on a Wal-Mart paycheck. Yet according to Forbes, Wal-Mart has the distinction of having five of its Walton owners ranked among America's 10 richest people. The Waltons do especially well while their employees do especially poorly, with clerks earning, on average, 40 percent less than unionized workers, and receiving either marginal health care coverage or none at all. Traditionally, grocery workers have been able to make somewhat a decent living. The wage of full-time unionized clerks averages around $15 an hour - $25,000-$30,000 annually, depending on hours worked. In addition, workers have had health care benefits. Wal-Mart's average associate makes about $8.00 an hour with about 32 hours of work a week - a monthly gross of barely over $1000. This makes it unlikely that he or she can afford the company's family health plan at $218 a month or almost 25~ of their gross income. Comm. NO. t Ref. To: Pres Ref. Uate JAN 2001 _