ABC‘s news division has a curious relationship with retail giant Walmart. Back in 2005 (Action Alert, 8/10/05), we noted that the network was boosting the company in its reporting while Walmart was a major ABC advertiser, most prominently as the sole sponsor of an “Only in America” series on Good Morning America.
While that kind of close relationship isn’t as obvious these days, the network’s Walmart boosterism is as clear as ever. On July 8 ABC World News aired a report on Walmart’s commitment to creating domestic jobs, linked to a company initiative to buy more products made in the United States–a convenient tie-in to an ABC series on the same theme (Extra!, 5/11).
“Tonight the largest retailer in the country makes news about its promise to spend billions of dollars supporting home-grown companies and American jobs,” anchor Diane Sawyer explained.
Reporter Rebecca Jarvis explained that Walmart was inviting US inventors to pitch ideas to the company; the winning ideas might someday be sold in Walmart stores. As Jarvis put it, this was all part of a
new promise from Walmart to spend $250 billion over the next decade on American-made products for their stores. Economists estimating that could create 1 million new jobs in the US.
The “economists” in question would appear to be the Boston Consulting Group, a consulting firm that advises major companies. It’s not a stretch to think that Walmart is one of them. So you might want to take those job creation numbers with a grain of salt.
But ABC‘s newscast looked less like journalism and more like PR–even including footage from a Walmart infomercial and a comment from the company’s CEO that this initiative “is not a PR thing.”
Jarvis seems aware of the benefits of all of this for the corporation, noting that “after a year of declining US sales and criticism for low wages, Walmart knows this is also good for their image.” Indeed.
While the feel-good ABC report touts the company’s somewhat sketchy job creation estimates, a more balanced look might include, for instance, some gesture towards the costs of Walmart’s low-price, low-wage business model. As the company’s critics have noted (MSNBC, 4/15/14), Walmart costs taxpayers “an estimated $6.2 billion in public assistance for low-wage Walmart employees, including programs like food stamps, subsidized housing and Medicaid.” One congressional report found that the employees at a single Walmart store in Wisconsin rely on about $1 million a year in public assistance to make ends meet.
Those aren’t the sort of numbers ABC is going to tout in its Walmart cheerleading–which leaves the company’s many critics off the screen.
Well Wal-fart has always championed “Falling Numbers”, they just didn’t mention that the numbers that were falling the fastest were the Wages and Benefits of the People who actually make them their money, The Employees.
“Tonight the largest retailer in the country makes news about its promise … ”
Actually, ABC makes the news.
Walmart just makes hype hay from it.
Doesn’t Walmart get a lot of what they sell from China? I mean almost all of it.
Don’t shop at that place and I never will, until they treat their employees like human beings and allow Unions to organize.
@SilverFox, I wouldn’t bother to shop there even then, as the products they have are total garbage. I used to shop there in the early days, when it was supposed to be the ‘Great American’ store (early to mid 90’s), That’s when I noticed that all the stuff that was supposed to American Made was not, it was only sent to America where it was stamped with Made in the USA when it was obvious it was manufactured in China or Indonesia and ‘imported’ by a corporation who had ‘Headquarters’ in certain countries and thus the Company was considered “America” even though the only person who was American was the CEO of the company.
That might have been livable with even in those days, as American Company (not the workers the owners) were bent on putting out as much garbage as they could with as little effort as possible, and the products would fall apart (Literally at the seams) or break in less 3 months.
Fast forward to 3 year ago, and for a lark I stopped in at one of the super centers (which are now bent on destroying all local business’s so the Wal-Tons can own more and more and pretend they are aristocracy) and decided to buy something that I was having a hard time finding anywhere else. Nope, two days later it fell apart. I thought maybe, just maybe it was one of those things, bad timing or whatever. So I take it back and exchange it, and before I could get it out the door it was already falling apart and breaking.
So good on you and save your money until they not only learn to treat the workers as people and not their (the Wal-Tons) personal whipping boys, pay a living wage to the regulars, and learn to buy goods that don’t come apart faster then Britney Spears Las Vegas Marriage.
I first learned not to trust Walmart when Paul Harvey used to hawk for them. I knew his “opinions” were mostly right-wing propaganda and any ads he did were the opposite of the truth, because that’s what his “news” was.
Abc highlights many companies that create jobs ,and produces products made in America, especially mom and pop companies. Walmart is not the first nor the last. I personally hate Walmart and do not shop there, but sometimes , like a child’s behavior, we must encourage positive steps. Hopefully positive results will lead to more positive behavior.
My company used to give gift cards to Wail-Mart as “bonuses” ( a benefit long gone). I needed a VCR, so I bought the cheapest one, made in China, of course. The rest were market-value or higher, but there’s always a loss leader to make it look like it’s cheaper there. When it broke within a week, I got a refund in cash (!), went somewhere else and got a much better one for a few bucks more, not made in China. I’ll never go back there.