11,000 apply for 400 openings at (Wal-Mart's) new Oakland store

[Newsjock]

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2005/08/17/MNGDPE91AH1.DTL

Pia Sarkar, Chronicle Staff Writer

For all the criticism that Wal-Mart receives for its low wages and minimal health benefits, the retail giant says more than 11,000 people in the Bay Area are clamoring to get a job at its new Oakland store.

... Stephen Levy, an economist for the Center for Continuing Study of the California Economy, said the pent-up demand for work reflects the Bay Area's slow recovery from the dot-com crash.

... "It's not about Wal-Mart -- it's about the rest of the labor market," Levy said. "If the rest of the labor market was strong, you wouldn't have 11, 000 people applying for 400 jobs."

more

[zbdent]

1. Do the employees get the "employee discount"?

I know that Wal-Mart gets the "employer's discount" - falsifying work records to hide the fact that "part-time" employees are working not only full-time hours, but overtime.

And being locked in at night . . .

[THUNDER HANDS]

28. I work 35-37 hours a week

and I'm considered part-time

[raccoon]

2. "it's about the rest of the labor market" --he's right about that.

That's 27.5 people applying for every one of those jobs--and most of them are crappy jobs. Geez.

Brother, can you spare a dollar?

[Barkley]

3. I bet many of the 11, 000 are looking for a second job

to boost their current income since wages are not increasing. In fact, real wages have fallen in recent months due to increases in inflation arising from higher gas prices.

[phusion]

19. Yea, it's uniquely American...

:argh:

[noshenanigans]

29. ain't that the truth...

I have a job right now that has a lot of driving (in Los Angeles, where gas is at least $2.85), and I'm actually looking forward to getting laid off next month- that's 40/60 bucks a week I won't be spending on gas because when I'm not working I can just stay the hell home.

[geomon666]

4. Recovery from the dot com crash?

Cute. More like from the Fiery Bush crash.

[barb162]

31. The recovery from the dot.com crash took place in Asia

This is the fierybush crash

[ET Awful]

5. Levy has it right.

Sorry, it's not that they are clamoring for a job at Wal-Mart, it's that they are clamoring for a job period. Of those 11,000 I'd venture a guess that 10,995 of them would take any job they were offered at Wal-Mart or anywhere else.

They don't want to work for Wal-Mart, they just want to work.

[fob]

6. Hey Mall-Wart! Having 11,000 people seek 400 jobs is NOT a sign

of a healthy economy. If you recall during the Clinton years people were getting MULTIPLE OFFERS and signing bonuses were commonplace.

I'd go so far to say that having that many people scramble for that few jobs is one of the signs of the Apocalypse.

[barb162]

30. yes, it is an extremely bad sign of how desperate people are

that they would work in that hole for scraps

[IADEMO2004]

7. What % of money spent at Walmart ends up in the Chinese military buildup?

[saigon68]

27. Most of it

[mitchtv]

34. What % of those 400 employees

will end up on MediCal?

[Child_Of_Isis]

8. Wal-mart, fast food and home health.

In my area, this is all the women have left. Even the educated.

[shanti]

10. that's where this country is headed

on a fast train - service sector mcjobs. everything else is/has been outsourced.

[Child_Of_Isis]

12. And at part time even!

It is already here in my area. Put in a few hours at McD's, then hop on over to wal-mart for a few hours. Women and the old folk are being hit the hardest. We are actually competing with our school kids for the same jobs. I am in Ohio. This is where they come to get their soldiers.

[geckosfeet]

9. And the economy just keeps on "churning out" minimum wage jobs. nt

[DiverDave]

11. Another sign of our "healthy economy"

:woohoo: :sarcasm:

[Squatch]

13. New Wal-Mart Supercenter opening near my home...

this Wally World is exactly 4.75 miles from the next closest one.

WTF?

[Doremus]

14. Those people couldn't all have been looking for jobs.

Unemployment is waaaaay down -- haven't you heard?

I'm sure they volunteered to give up their day to wait in long lines just to help Wal-Crap gloat about how everybody loves them.

:sarcasm:



Removed from the article:

"Most of the applicants said they were making another stop that day: to County Services to apply for the food stamps that are a pre-requisite to having a Wal-Crap job."

[mountainvue]

15. This is so sad. n/t

[sniffa]

16. so he's bragging?

is this simiLar to, "yay! i have incurabLe cancer! woot!"

[Zorra]

17. We are in very serious trouble. The republicans must go. n/t

[auburngrad82]

18. What's this say about the economy when 11K apply for min wage jobs?

Is there nothing better than Wal-Mart?

[MGKrebs]

20. And they are not even open yet?

There will be another 1000 jobs lost when the WalMart puts several small, independent shops around them out of business.

[sadiesworld]

21. Bah!

Nothing that can't be fixed through more trade agreements, H-B1 visas, and a guest worker program.

I am literally nauseous. Fuck the republicans and the vichy dems who seem to have no greater goal than to destroy the lives of the working people in this country.

[caligirl]

22. we lost over 300,000 jobs here folks. Those jobs aren't and have not

come back. My husband works for a semicoductor chip equipment maker
This company went from 17,000 employees to 11000 employees. The layoffs have stopped. The office he was in lost at least 5 people leaving only him.

The silli valley saw what can only be described as depression equivalent job losses. Foreclosures were huge here for awhile.


Wages like this:"The company offers an average hourly wage in the Bay Area of $10.82. It says it employs more than 66,000 people at its 150 stores in California."


won't cut it in Oakland or anywhere else. These people aren't taking these jobs for slave wagers that will not pay escalating housing costs because they want to. this place is getting screwed by walMart.
Silicon Valley jobs lost were payingg twice that plus health benefits.

A family of 4 needs to bring in $70,000 to stay afloat here. The price of housing and food is really high not to mention child care(700+ a month is common, 200 is unheard of here.. You won't get child care on $10.00 an hour here. The kids are on their own now.

This is the raping and destruction of the middle class by Bush. His kind get huge tax breaks while the working poor get screwed.

[caligirl]

23. Oh and Wal mart just recently tried to get out of the discrimination

suit filed by women it cheated out of wages and promotions by claiming they were being sued by too many women. The number of women in the suit is several thousand. Hope the lady in Oakland(former computer worker) hears about that.

[caligirl]

24. 1.6 million women and charges Wal-Mart with discriminating against female

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Lawyers for Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (NYSE:WMT - news) urged a federal appeals court on Monday to block a sex-discrimination lawsuit against it that could cost the retailer an estimated billions of dollars.
ADVERTISEMENT

The retailer is seeking to overturn a June 2004 U.S. District Court decision certifying as class-action a lawsuit that now covers more than 1.6 million women and charges Wal-Mart with discriminating against female workers in pay, promotions and training.

Attorneys for the six lead plaintiffs say the case is the largest civil-rights class-action in U.S. history ever certified and could cost Wal-Mart billions of dollars in economic losses.

But during a hearing in San Francisco, Wal-Mart attorney Ted Boutrous said the appellate judges should overturn the lower court's decision because the charges of the six lead plaintiffs were not typical or common of the entire class.

He also argued that the lower court's decision stripped Wal-Mart of its right to defend itself by ruling that the retailer could not call individual store managers to the stand to testify, for example, that there was no bias against women.

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20050809/bs_nm/retail_walmart_lawsuit_dc

[Gregorian]

25. So sad. Welcome to the third world order.

In 1989 I heard the phrase "service oriented". I knew immediately what that meant. We're there. God save the Queen.

[Tyranny_R_US]

26. There are alot of poor people who are just looking for a job

They don't give a damn about the politics my mother is one of them.

[area51]

32. This is insanity.

We are so obviously in the 2nd Great Depression. The right-wing media won't talk about it, so when people are fired from their jobs, they're truly shocked that they can't find a job.

[go freedom]

33. Yeah, the unemployment rate is only 5%. n/t