How would you feel if you lost $11 billion in one day? I would feel awful.
Think how the Waltons must feel. They lost that much when their stock in Walmart tanked. Since January 1, they have lost $41 billion.
It tanked because of competiton with Internet vendors and because they have to pay more to their workers. Imagine their nerve expecting to claim minimum wage!
I think the Waltons will get through it. They still have $120 billion.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Only 120 billion Diane. Think of how much philanthropy that 11 billion would buy!
Also if the waltons can lose that kind of money because of the market, imagine how excited our seniors on much more limited income feel with their free market 401Ks
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Paper loss.
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Seniors are about to have their Medicare premiums go up by 50% this year and “daughter” of sinister Bela Lugosi Nancy Pelosi is saying it would take about 10 billion dollars in the federal budget added to Medicare to prevent the increase. Meanwhile,the COLA in this program has been drastically reduced.
And yet, the ever vicious Walton heirs can well afford to lose 11 billion dollars.
This is exactly the setup people like Joe Nathan and Rudy Schellekens have hoped for and gotten. It’s not difficult to predict what this sort of thing will result in.
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Military Retirees are in the same boat with Social Security recipients — no increase next year. Nothing new.
But, you can bet the legislators in Washington DC will get their 10% increase in pay. Wait and see!!
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I wonder why government workers (legislators) do not get the same raise as the active duty military…which is also very low and usually only 2-3% more than the retirees.
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Truckers who worked years in tough, back breaking jobs are seeing their pensions cut in half by a new law passed by Congress. Some are in their 70’s.
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“It is the Ohio Department of Education’s goal to have middle school and high school students more focused on careers through their education. The ODE is now requiring all Ohio School Districts to have a career advising policy for students. That requirement began at the start of the current school year.”
I can no longer keep track of all the ed reform unfunded mandates in this state. They just pile one atop another, endlessly, while they cut budgets.
They seem utterly incapable of saying “no” to anything “movement” lobbyists come up with. Each group in the “movement” gets everything they want, and they just dump the whole mess on public schools.
The superintendents are finally organizing and speaking out but one would think some adult in this vast, well-compensated army of ed reformers would break ranks and yell “STOP”, but it never happens. No system of any kind could do all these things at once, let alone do them well, especially with lower funding. They’re setting them up to fail.
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I once worked in a Fortune 500 company the day the stock took a nosedive. The executors were depressed and panicked and angry that their personal fortunes were hit even just on paper. The Waltons might be able to afford this loss but it doesn’t mean it stings any less. This is a good day.
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I would not feel a thing if I were Walmart. I would be a corporation, not a person. Companies are abstract, inanimate things without beating hearts.
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I might say the same about the executives and heirs.
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Unfortunately the Citizens United decision has turned corporations into “persons” and until this cow pile decision is overturned, corporations have the same rights as you and I do….wait a minute…they have a helluva lot more.
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I can honestly verify that I will NEVER lose 11 billion or even one billion dollars in my LIFETIME>
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The fact that Wal-Mart, of all companies, is having trouble competing on price is actually rather disturbing.
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FLERP, it was clear some time ago that the big fish would eat the little fish. And that would work until an even bigger fish appeared. Ten years from now, Amazon and one or two other internet giants will have consumed Walmart, which consumed Main Street, destroying small businesses. Maybe the analogy in education is that the charters first consume the Catholic schools (“free” beats “tuition”); then charters consume urban schools; then the charter chains consume the mom-and-pop charters. Ten-20 years from now, parents will choose which charter chain to enroll in. Open questions: will suburbs fight for their schools? Will exurbs and rural areas? I still hope that KIPP will take charge of a complete urban district, like one of those low-performing Michigan districts given to charter chains, and show its stuff when it must educate all kids.
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I agree from a business sense. Walmart grew to such size by exploiting differences in labor markets, mainly cheap labor in China. Amazon grew with the help of tax free sales. Now, China is showing signs of trouble, and states are taxing Amazon sales. The U.S. businesses have been focused on costs or just pushing around money. Instead of inventing new drugs, hedge funds and patent lawyers swoop in and make profits from exploring markets by fiat. We don’t build quality in products, only the appearance of it. The concern is there isn’t another Internet boom or industrial revolution in the works.
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This is what they should do, if they are to do the right thing. It is only right that they treat employees like they are U.S. workers, who should be treated with respect and dignity. The Waltons should take pride in the fact that they take care of their employees in a socially responsible way. This will mean that they won’t profit quite as much, but as you say, they can still make plenty of $$, maybe just not quite as much!
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As Dienne said, “paper loss.” A mere pittance to the Walton heirs.
Figuring that, in the near future, large numbers of Walmart workers will be laid off, & without severance pay.
Just like the Kochs losing (can’t remember the very large figure, but everyone should read the book, Sons of Wichita, anyway, to get the bigger picture) a lawsuit involving the beyond tragic & totally avoidable incineration deaths of two promising young people, one to leave for college–on a full academic scholarship–that very next day (however, since they lived in trailers,they were presumably “trailer trash” to the Kochs & their buddies) when they drove over some poorly maintained Koch pipeline (which the execs @ Koch Industries had been repeatedly warned about by their underlings). The more odious Koch bros. were beyond livid at having to pay a large sum to the families.
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