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Wal-Mart Ethical Case Study

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Wal-Mart is one of the largest retail stores in the world with total revenue of $421.8 billion and a net income of $16.4 billion in 2011. Wal-Mart has been engaging in illegal and unethical behavior by using bargaining power and market control to pressure countries to disregard environmental degradation and violation of national labor laws (Sethi par.1). There were six cases related to unpaid work that made Wal-Mart to pay $1 billion in damages to U.S. employees (Sethi par.2). Wal-Mart has faced several scandals in overseas such as multiple cases of bribery. According to New York Times, Wal-Mart paid more than $24 million to Mexican officials and their internal reports indicated hundreds of bribery and frauds. There were 90 reports of bribery …show more content…

One of the ethical issues of the Nike was abusing the employees and using the child labor in overseas factories. Employees were abused physically and mentally. The physical abuses of employees were slapping, kicking and scratching until some people bled. Management mentally abused employees by calling them monkey, dog, and pig. The employees were making $0.50 an hour and they were keeping their mouths shut. One the female employee was fired after she spoke up against the management (Stewart par.2). Like many Multinational Companies Nike employees in Indonesia had low wages and poor working conditions. The employees were getting $14 cents an hour, less than Indonesia’s minimum wage. Nike faced international criticism when the life magazine published an article about the 12 year old Pakistani boy’s hands stitching a Nike soccer ball at home (Stop Nike Sweatshops). Wal-Mart and Nike could have been avoided these issues by having loyalty and respect for rules and regulations, integrity, fairness, transparency, confidentiality, avoidance of an appearance of impropriety, and due diligence. Wal-Mart and Nike have to treat overseas employees fairly as they treat employees in the USA. Wal-Mart and Nike have to stop focusing on low cost output and cheap labor. They have to make an investment to improve unsafe working conditions and low wages. They have to stop buying outputs from the factories operating

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When we hear of the apparel retailer, Lululemon, we usually think of really overpriced athletic clothing. Lululemon is a luxurious brand for those who want to invest in high quality athletic clothing. This retail company was originally founded in Vancouver, Canada in 1998. In addition, the founder of the company is Denis “Chip” Wilson, who is no longer affiliated with the incorporation due to his unprofessionalism. Over the past twenty years, Lululemon has faced a couple ethical issues, but their ethical culture has also impacted their relationship with customers and employees.

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Walmart was founded in the summer of 1962 by Kingfisher, Oklahoma native Sam Walton. Although Walton’s original vision for the store was relatively modest, the half century since its founding has seen Walmart morph into one of the biggest companies in the world. Today headed by one Doug McMillon, Walmart boasts more than 5000 stores in the United States of America alone and employs more than 1.5 million people. Walmart is undoubtedly an American institution, yet each Walmart store feels like its own little country. Walmart seems to have its own laws and customs and the people who shop their on a regular basis appear almost primitive in their behavior as they go about raiding the store’s shelves and wrestling with fellow customers for discount flat screen televisions and bulk packages of two-ply toilet paper.

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Often times a worker 's wages are often too low to feed a family, the factory air is often filled with chemicals and many managers refuse to let sick employees leave work to get medical attention. At many factories, labor rights advocates say, managers have improved ventilation, stopped hitting workers, and have stopped requiring workers to obtain permission before going to the toilet. The anti-sweatshop movement has put many apparel makers, like the Gap and Kathie Lee Gifford, on the defensive by bombarding companies with letters, holding sit-ins at colleges and picketing in front of stores. Many apparel industry executives say that they are encouraged to turn to substandard factories, because shoppers are always hunting for bargains, so they face intense pressure to produce goods as cheaply as possible. In one noteworthy move made by Nike and its rival Reebok was to require the many Asian factories that produce for them to stop using petroleum-based adhesives that cause damage to the liver, kidney and central nervous system in favor of safer water-based adhesives.

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Behind the Swoosh is a documentary about sweatshop labor. As a class we watched the documentary and as I learned more about how Nike was running their business; I felt bad for the people that were working. I could not believe that those people were working hard making that company so much money and was getting nothing in return. Then again, I really was not shocked because I know that they are people that put a lot of blood, sweat and tears into a company and do not make enough money.

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YISHENG ZHANG MACROECONOMICS - WRITING ESSAY FEBRUARY 27, 2017 Walmart, as one of the world’s largest company it’s corporation contains grocery shopping, pharmacy, electronic sales, an outside garden etc. It is very convenient for people all around the world and low income families who are unable to afford other expensive goods made in the United States. Since Walmart is considered a world wide’s supermarket, it has investments outside of the United States such as in China, United Kingdom, and south America. When the prices are less, people are able to afford these products and throughout the century, it’s easy to tell that Walmart has made a huge impact in the United States economy.

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David Montero explains that in Sialkot, Pakistan there is a business, Saga Sports, that creates the Nike soccer balls by hand, the problem Nike has with the company is that they employ children to work in unjust conditions. “In November, Nike severed its contract with Saga Sports, its chief supplier, saying Saga's poor management exposes Nike to the threat of child labor and other labor violations,” (Montero). The chief executive of Nike is trying to reduce the amount of children that produce their goods in unfair conditions. The executive wants consumers to know that they are buying products that were manufactured the proper way of not having children make these items in appalling conditions that could threaten their health. The evidence suggest that working conditions is another reason that the United States consumers should not buy products that are made by

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What is Foxconn’s unethical issue? In mid 2010, Foxconn Technology Group (Foxconn) was facing a crisis of having its workers held protests and riots against the company in Shenzhen, China. Being the world’s largest contract electronics manufacturer (Pun, 2010), the company exploited its migrant workers by providing them with exceptionally low pay and allowing unacceptable number of overtime working hours in the manufacturing site. Such method of raising workers’ efficiency is unethical in the eyes of many.

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The article “Labouring the Walmart Way,” author Deenu Parmar talks about how Walmart is able to achieve selling goods at a lower price then any average superstore. The author goes on to explain that Walmart’s antiunion efforts, employee selection, low prices and high retention rate all contribute to their major success. Walmart’s stance on ant unionism allows them to keep wage cost down and keep all their profits up. Not allowing a union keeps Walmart with the power to keep low wages and force unpaid overtime.

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Additionally, Nike Inc. entered a globalized market because the organization had a solid financial base that could support its factories abroad. Though critics argued that Nike implemented a cheap labor policy to manufacture its products, nevertheless, without a stable financial base, it would have been difficult to globalize the organization. In a related development, Nike’s presence in the globalized market encourages a massive inequality in the society. While suppliers were much better off, the laborers were worse off and the organization looks the other way because it was part of doing a business in the globalized market. So, it is fair to say that entering a global market costs

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‘Is Wal-Mart Good for America?’ On PBS Frontline, May 11, 2015 ‘Is Wal-Mart Good for America?’ is a documentary that examines the relationship between Wal-Mart’s rapid growth and its impact on the US economy ever since it blossomed in trade productivity in the mid 20th century. The documentary, published on February 2014 by PBS Frontline, conveys a deep understanding of how Wal-Mart changed the living standards of many Americans and took consumerism and retail logistics in the U.S. to another level; by cutting costs through offshore outsourcing to China and employing cheap Chinese labor. The documentary focuses on the changing relationship between big retailers and manufacturers and the transition in pricing and decision-making.

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• 1991: Problems start in 1991 when activist Jeff Ballinger publishes a report documenting low wages and poor working conditions in Indonesia. • Nike first formally responds to complaints with a factory code of conduct. • 1992 : Ballinger publishes an exposé of Nike.

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The push Walmart is making to build stores in Mexico, South America, and China means that Walmart management in those countries may face the temptation to bribe foreign officials to give Walmart preferential treatment to zoning and other matters that require foreign governmental approval (Ferrell 414). Walmart has already faced this issue with its Walmex branch of operations, which has been accused of bribing Mexican officials to streamline zoning and permit issues that are often more burdensome in Mexico than in the United States (Ferrell 414). Certainly bribery may be more common in the developing countries that Walmart intends to expand its operations into. Therefore, Walmart officials are likely to continue to face the issue of how to ensure that its management of overseas operations maintains ethical standards and avoids the temptation of bribing government officials to give Walmart preferential treatment (Ferrell

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