I follow WMT's labor relations and "cost cutting" practices with some interest, as do many here.
On hearing the news about the store up in Canada that they're closing because the employees exercized their moral and constitutional right to organize and bargain collectively, I began thinking about how we could make this effort a success.
Take a look at these ideas and let me know what you think.
First, we need to channel all the anti-WMT energy that exists into one organization.
I propose we set up an endownment and begin raising money to undertake what seems to me to be a relatively inexpensive project:
Find WMT stores with a relatively high percentage of employees ("associates") inclined toward unionization. Then, guarantee each employee a $300 check every week for 3 months if the attempt to organize fails. That way, even if WMT closes shop, the folks would get paid for a full 12 weeks, presumably giving them time to find another job but without losing any wages. Actually, they'd be making more money in some cases.
This would cost just over one million dollars per store. We could pay laid-off ex-WMT workers $300 a week for 12 weeks, and assuming each store had 300 workers, it would cost $1,080,000. If we raised $20M, we could do this on a pretty decent scale. Would WMT really close 20 stores? I doubt it. But I don't know...
Surely some rich person out there would pay $1M to unionize a WMT store, right?
So, what am I not seeing? Is this a good idea? A bad one? Illegal? Unlikely?
If not this, what do you suggest?