The Guardian: 'We Built It'? Republicans' invocation of entrepreneurism has a hollow ring

[Prosperity]

Just something I noticed yesterday, and it may fit in here.
(As y'all know, economics topics are not my best)

Yesterday I did some driving and I noticed something.. in nearly every shopping center I passed.. i looked at the businesses inside.
Hair salons. Nail salons. Insurance agents. Liquor stores. Food.
That's pretty much it.

No small shops of any kind selling a product.. except Verizon.
Every store in which you could buy anything BUT a service or food was a big box.

Now, we all know the Wal \Mart effect, but I wonder how much of that has to do with small business in decline. No one can open a shop and sell products anymore,, they can't compete. so unless you provide a service or are a restaurant of some kind, you're not opening up.

So destruction of that segment of our small business is one,, and we also know that Wal Mart is so big as to force companies that want to do business with them to provide goods to them at a certain cost, and they don't care how many people get fired to get the price down to what Wal mart expects.
I saw a piece on some of these American companies that manufacture for Wal Mart.. Their employees are basically working at the poverty level to stay in business because theyhave t meet Wal Mart's demand.the one factory they profiled showed something like 80% of their workfoRce on public assistance because they work for minimum wage, and there's next to no chance of that changing.

How much effect does this have on this topic?

~Bang

The opposite is true where I live (San Francisco) there are small shops everywhere. Small grocery stores, clothing stores, book stores, even small hardware stores. One reason is that there just isn't a whole lot of space here for big box stores. Another reason is that there are a lot of wealthy residents and tourists who want stuff that is more exclusive than big boxes have to offer. Finally people are downright hostile to the big boxes. Though there is a Target moving in downtown soon so who knows if that's the future for this place as well.

[mistertim]

nice post

but are they predatory, or simply functioning in the the atmosphere we create thru social supports?

Sorry, missed this.

I think its probably some of both. However, I would put more towards the "nature" side of it as far as them being predatory. Most of the time these corporations (and business in general) have a single goal: profits. Everything else is secondary. If something or somebody gets hurt because of what the company does...well that's just too bad, this is business. The sociopathic tendencies are hardwired into the genes. But they're also supported and nurtured through the atmosphere we create. So that predatory impluse is hardwired to a point but then also nurtured and encouraged.

If you enable people to work at lower wages they will,you just shift the costs to the taxpayers at large

Of course they will. People have to at least try to put food on the table and keep a roof over their heads. That doesn't mean this "race to the bottom" is a good thing.