However, trying to live without the moderating influence that Walmart has on the ravages of inequality is a worse problem than trying to figure out how to get infrastructure paid for.
The poor living without infrastructure actually keeps them poor (can't commute to work, say). The poor not being to buy at Wallmart leaves them with Amazon and with a corner store that might rip them off a bit but has some relation to their lives.
Edit: I mean, I live on a limited income and have plenty of friends as close to absolute poverty as it gets. None depend on Walmart in particular though some depend on Target, an equivalent. You can live even more cheaply buying from thrift stores than Walmart. Moreover, most people who can go to the giant big box stores have working cars which put them on a tier slightly above the very poorest.
Sure, broadly, the last thirty years of declining wages for the working class have been softened by the flood of cheap manufactured goods. But that's overall - Walmart is not the only conduit of this flood, though it's helped. And Walmart + other big box stores also benefit from economies of scale and dodging taxes for infrastructure. Of course, it's reasonable to say Walmart isn't a pure evil but touting it as a net good seems equally misguided. The despair of "Walmart-ized" small town American is well documented.
For example, It sounds impossible that lots of people today subsist out in the middle nowhere, where the bus services barely exist, without their cars. But this is what happens today and the cuts in infrastructure, no buses and etc, hurt this group a lot.
The poor living without infrastructure actually keeps them poor (can't commute to work, say). The poor not being to buy at Wallmart leaves them with Amazon and with a corner store that might rip them off a bit but has some relation to their lives.
Edit: I mean, I live on a limited income and have plenty of friends as close to absolute poverty as it gets. None depend on Walmart in particular though some depend on Target, an equivalent. You can live even more cheaply buying from thrift stores than Walmart. Moreover, most people who can go to the giant big box stores have working cars which put them on a tier slightly above the very poorest.
Sure, broadly, the last thirty years of declining wages for the working class have been softened by the flood of cheap manufactured goods. But that's overall - Walmart is not the only conduit of this flood, though it's helped. And Walmart + other big box stores also benefit from economies of scale and dodging taxes for infrastructure. Of course, it's reasonable to say Walmart isn't a pure evil but touting it as a net good seems equally misguided. The despair of "Walmart-ized" small town American is well documented.
For example, It sounds impossible that lots of people today subsist out in the middle nowhere, where the bus services barely exist, without their cars. But this is what happens today and the cuts in infrastructure, no buses and etc, hurt this group a lot.