The Amazing Atheist on Walmart and the "Free Market"

[Guest - Josh -]

I am not sure where this post belongs, so I'm posting it in this category just so I can't go wrong.
 
For those of you who don't know, Mr. Kinkaid, better known as “TJ” Kirk or The Amazing Atheist, has a channel with over four times the number of subscribers that FDR does. He is probably best known for his colorful language, as well as his rants against feminism, Republicans, Obama, and Christianity.
 
However my issue today is with his portrayal of the free market in the following video; warning, it is his personal preference to talk like a sailor:
 

 

 

Now, I’m not one to defend Walmart, but I know enough about it to know that corporations can’t really be a part of a truly free market, to say the least. And I don’t know what libertarians he has in mind who really love Walmart.
 
I don’t have a YouTube account, but I just thought this would be an opportunity for anyone who does to respond to his video with a reply video or a comment.  
 
Karen Straughan, a libertarian MRA better known as girlwriteswhat, has already joined in on the fun; she wrote:

 

Walmart costs the US taxpayer at least $4 billion a year, between welfare and medicaid programs, and tariffs with China. Every 200 jobs Walmart creates eliminates 266 jobs in smaller businesses. 

Welfare programs, tariffs, corporate regulations, business/payroll taxes, all of that, are decided by governments. It is government that allows Walmart to do what it's doing. Walmart is not capitalism (free market), it is corporatism (corporate monopoly + government regulation, subsidy and enforcement). If there were no welfare programs, no 10:1 tariff agreement with China, and no exorbitant licensing fees/payroll taxes, smaller businesses would be able to keep people employed and compete. 

You know who loves government regulations? Not single-operator taxi drivers in DC but monopolistic taxi fleets who can afford a million bucks to license a taxi cab. Monopolies adore government regulations, because it keeps entrepreneurs out of the game.

 

 

Government keeps Walmart in business. Not just in social services benefits like medicaid, but in shitty trade deals that allow China to charge 25% on raw materials from the US while paying only 2.5% tariff on value added materials entering the US. 

It's not just US taxpayers who are subsidizing Walmart, it's the companies that ship logs and iron and steel and nickel and coal to China who are subsidizing Walmart.

If there were nor tariffs and no welfare, Walmart would HAVE to be competitive in its own right. But government regulation favors monopolies.

 

 

I don’t really care if anyone manages to change TJ’s mind, it’s his followers I’m worried about. If they’re atheists, it may be a stretch to say that they’re at least halfway rational already, but maybe it’s worth a shot at making a response?

 

Of course if Stef were to also make a brief response vid, well, that would make my day. It’s not so say that TJ would be a worthy debating opponent or anything, but it might be of interest to him to know that The Amazing Atheist channel is always listed under “Related Channels” on the FDR YouTube homepage (along with TYT to say the least). It’s like a featured channel that isn’t really endorsed by Stef. That is of course YouTube’s doing, which I’m sure they’ll see fit to address right after they take care of this Google+ nonsense.

[Kevin Beal]

I used to be really into the anti-walmart thing. I read books about it, watched documentaries.

 

Personally, I think creating a situation in which there are fewer jobs necessary to achieve the same level of economic value is a good thing. Walmart costing jobs is not necessarily a bad thing.

 

They do some pretty messed up shit to be sure, like close a branch entirely the moment a union is formed, doing all sorts of sneaky things to push people off of the property they want to develop on, the shit they pull with vendors, not great. However, the value they create probably far outweighs the damage.

 

They do an enormous amount to keep costs low, their margins are paper thin, they put a lot of control in the hands of local people.

 

The way people focus on walmart as the reason that small businesses close down, never looking at the insane regulations and other burdens placed on small businesses by government makes me believe that they don't really know what the heckeroony they are talking about. If walmart is bad, then government is infinitely worse (and it is).

 

Jeffrey Tucker is a big fan of WalMart and has some material about it that's worth looking at:

 

http://lfb.org/today/wal-mart-victim-of-extortion/

 

He also has a video where he talks about WalMart that I can't find at the moment...

[Pepin]

In my experience in going to Walmart, Walmart workers tend to be very unskilled not very good at their jobs. There is a strong tendency for them to be overweight, above the age of 50, and not particularly nice.

 

The entire argument that TAA makes is that the condition of the employee is the result of the wage Walmart provides, as opposed to being the result of the choices the employees have made in their lives with the addition of other factors. There is a preference on the left to see these results in more immediate terms than looking at the broader picture, which is a fatal mistake. It is like looking at the health of a man who's smoked for forty years, and attributing all of ill health effects to present circumstances and factors as opposed to the choices taken over a long period of time. Why is someone who has had twenty to thirty years of work experience and a greater amount of time in attaining knowledge, skills, and resources: working for minimum wage?

 

As pointed out, Walmart doesn't have very clean hands in far as subsides and so on, but I think that is a separate argument/topic. TAA brings up the subject to berate profit and to lambaste greed, though he does make this argument. "If Walmart has made a $16x10^9 profit, why not pay their employees $5,000 more a year?".

 

TAA isn't very good at thinking and making arguments, especially in regards to politics. He had a little feud with this guy a little while back and it was quite bad.

[FriendlyHacker]

You know why Walmart workers are unskilled and not very good at their jobs? Because they work at a shitty job for meager wage, and hate it. Incidentally they can't afford higher education and can't even afford to commute there even if it they were to have it for free. Knowing you're being screwed over and that you are a slave, also makes you more prone to depression, procrastination, high blood pressure, domestic violence and many other problems.

 

If you think that is bad for people on the USA, ever wonder what actually happens in poor countries? When someone says people don't work hard enough, it makes me want to drag them down to the factory in Thailand that makes their fancy cellphones and hipster clothing, and tell them: Look at that mother fuckers! Just fucking look at those people who work 18 hours a day and don't even have the time to think about studying, and then you tell me how much fucking harder effort you put into your cushy office job!

 

Then you can tell me: Dude, didn't you just say you only have up to high school education and you're doing alright?

 

The only reason I only have up to high school education, is because my parents have a combined total of 5 undergraduate degrees + scientific training in math, physics and engineering. Plus I lived in a mid class family and had access to computers and Internet before most people even knew what that was.

 

So you see, if your parents work at Walmart and don't know much about anything, you tend to be that way too. Stefan might have lived in a poor family (maybe poor by Canadian standards), but has said he lived in an intellectually rich environment there, and is not fair to compare that to someone who has parents who can't read or write.

[Pepin]

Is that directed towards my post?