Re: Re: RE: WMT goes orgo
On Aug 28, 2006, at 4:12 PM, Wojtek Sokolowski wrote:
But I find it hard to believe the 80% figure. The corresponding figure for the public sector, definitely the most
unionized sector in this country, is about 36%. That would make US food
retailers the most unionized industry in the US, and probably in the world.
You’re misquoting again: “union density in many regions in
supermarkets is like 80%!”
I think that singling out retailers like Whole Foods has more to do with blue collar anti-intellectualism (your use of vernacular seems symptomatic) and silly resentment and kulturkampf against “yuppies” than any serious effort to advance the cause of labor in this
country. I doubt that. Whole Food trades on its crunchy image, but it’s furiously anti-union. I wouldn’t be surprised if Wal-Mart isn’t[WS:] No doubt, but so is most of the US industry. So why singling
out Whole Foods, which suspiciously coincides with the blue collar vitriol against environmentalism and urban liberalism? My point is not that anti-union image is unfair for Whole Foods, but that singling it
out is - and smacks of culture wars. It is akin to attacking capitalism by
singling out Jews - it makes one think that anti-capitalism is really a
veneer for a kulturkampf.
Oh please. There’s something extra-annoying about profit-maximizing
businesses that pretend to be better than everyone else. Whole Foods
is a nasty union-busting firm but it gets to pretend to be all
sensitive and shit. With Wal-Mart, what you see is what you get. I
hate all those socially responsible business types, and I can play
urban elitist with the best of them.
Doug