Walmart Abuses Rights

Published in The Milpitas Post, December 10, 2009.

Letters to the Editor, pp. 31-32.

Walmart abuses rights

Dear Editor,

Walmart in Milpitas should not be allowed to replace good local jobs that pay living wages and health benefits with more Walmart poverty-level jobs by expanding into a Supercenter.

Residents of Milpitas do not want to see friends and neighbors who work in good paying grocery store jobs be displaced by poorly treated Walmart workers, one out of two whose children live without health care or rely on a public program. In communities where Walmart has opened or expanded, scores of smaller mom and pop stores have closed.  Often these workers have no place else to work except for this company at their poverty-level wages.

In 2008, Walmart Inc. yearly profits passed $13.4 billion, but workers see little of this gain.  Women fill the majority of low-paid jobs, and have for years faced gender discrimination.  There are now more than 1.5 million  female employees suing Walmart for sex-based discrimination, the largest ever filed in the United States.  Chief plaintiff Betty Dukes herself worked for years at a Richmond, California Walmart while being repeatedly passed over for training and promotion.

The City of Milpitas should not reward a company that flagrantly abuses women’s rights by allowing it to grab an even bigger share of Milpitas dollars.

Daislyn Pease, Treasurer,
9to5 Bay Area, National
Association of Working Women

Editor's Note: View the attached .PDF file to see an image of the original letter as published in The Milpitas Post, along with another letter by 9to5 Bay Area member, Jennifer Touchton.  Please note that the Milpitas Walmart expansion will be the subject of a community breakfast at Sunnyhills United Methodist Church in Milpitas on Saturday, January 9, 2010 at 8:00 AM.

http://9to5.org/local/california/ourwork/events/milpitas-community-breakfast