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Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by leggomylibro on Friday June 02, 2017 @12:53PM (#14471370)
Ugh. I think that this sort of attitude (which was my initial reaction too) is a big part of what's wrong with our current economy.

If you take the concept at face value, this is Walmart offering to let their employees make some extra money in exchange for a bit of extra work, once they've clocked out. What a nice company.

But realistically, this is Walmart shunting the costs of delivery onto their employees. Instead of paying their employees a living wage, or offering benefits befitting a delivery driver, they can offset all of the risk, deprecation costs, etc associated with delivering a package all for the low cost of what amounts to a tiny raise in their existing payroll.

Walmart chooses what they pay their associates, and what hours they get. So it's not really appropriate for them to start becoming arbiters of opportunities to make extra money "outside of work." This is shady as all hell.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by SilasX on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:08PM (#14471541)
You don't think you're jumping the gun here, maybe? Do you even know what the compensation will be?

>Instead of paying their employees a living wage, or offering benefits befitting a delivery driver,

Obviously you can criticize Walmart's current practices. The issue is whether this policy is any worse than what they had before.

>they can offset all of the risk, deprecation costs, etc associated with delivering a package all for the low cost of what amounts to a tiny raise in their existing payroll.

Do you give the same objection to every other company that pays for mileage for work-related travel? Is that also "shunting off depreciation costs"?

Why are you assuming that they won't have an insurance policy for such deliveries or pay for mileage like every other company?

Edit: clarified which part was responding to what

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Spooky23 on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:50PM (#14472404)
They currently don't use retail employees to deliver stuff. So you can't compare these practices.

As someone who is probably a professional salaried employee somewhere, it's hard to think about why this is bad.

When you're stuck in one of these gigs, you need to be in good with the floor managers to get hours -- those folks control you because they have the power to starve you out with limited hours or "on call" shifts (i.e. you wait around and be ready to report to work within 15-20 minutes), or just fuck you over by assigning you impossible shifts and firing you for attendance issues.

So it's pretty much a given that if you are that guy who doesn't agree to deliver crap on the way home, you're not going to be around for long.

They are replacing UPS/Fedex/USPS for a reason -- cutting corners on things like insurance, depreciation, etc allows them to make an incredible inefficient operating model cheaper.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by frgtpsswrdlame on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:54PM (#14472439)
From further down this thread:

https://techcrunch.com/2017/06/01/walmart-begins-testing-usi...

    Workers also have to ... provide proof of insurance.
This is exactly the same as everything else gig-economy, the money is made by offloading risk onto the unsuspecting.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by maxxxxx on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:55PM (#14472444)
" You don't think you're jumping the gun here, maybe? Do you even know what the compensation will be?"

Judging from the way most companies compensate their employees for extra work I bet it won't be much. Just a guess.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by a3n on Friday June 02, 2017 @05:01PM (#14473276)
> Why are you assuming that they won't have an insurance policy for such deliveries or pay for mileage like every other company?

The fact that they're piggy backing on employees going home, regardless of extra pay, tells me that they're doing this on the cheap. If this part is on the cheap, there's no reason to assume that the rest isn't.

Win win!

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by leggomylibro on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:31PM (#14471783)
You're right that I don't know all the details, but I know how Walmart tends to behave with regards to their workers, and I know that the system their proposing looks unusually ripe for abuse, to the point where it seems like it must have been intentional.

I'm tired of people wrapping shit in a pretty bow and trying to pass it off as a gift. It keeps happening, and people keep going along with it. Maybe this time we'll unwrap the policy to find a nugget of gold, but fool me umpteen times...

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by aaron-lebo on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:10PM (#14472104)
What do you propose?

I'm against exploitation of workers, too, but at the end of the day there is only so much you can do with jobs that require relatively unskilled labor. If a 15 year old can do your job as well as you can after a few months of training, it's not a safe job that you can expect anything out of. It's gonna get automated away anyway.

But here Walmart (whatever their other faults), offers a way for workers to make money doing something they already have to (thus it has more utility than their normal role), and they're evil?

If people's regular jobs paid a "living wage", people wouldn't have to Uber, but it's how the world works.

Kind of damned if you do damned if you don't isn't it?

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by sangnoir on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:34PM (#14472302)
> If a 15 year old can do your job as well as you can after a few months of training, it's not a safe job that you can expect anything out of

Yet there is a world of a difference between Walmart jobs and Costco jobs. Unemployment in the US is lower than some countries with better worker's rights.

> If people's regular jobs paid a "living wage", people wouldn't have to Uber, but it's how the world works

No, not the world, mostly just the US. For the rest of the world, the line between employment and unemployment is not so bad that you have people with full-time jobs and still need food stamps. I feel that setup is a covert government subsidy to corporates. But hey, we shouldn't mess with the "job-creaters", right? Or else.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by oxide on Friday June 02, 2017 @03:02PM (#14472493)
If you work at Walmart, you've got fuck all to show for it.

Working at Costco sounds like a dream in direct comparison. Benefits, decent pay, etc. Hell, they have an entire wall dedicated to employees of the month that go way back. It's funny how a little goodwill towards your workers seems to have a ripple effect, making shopping at Costco a lot less stressful since the workers are relaxed and happy, willing to small talk while they ring ya up, the managment is roaming around managing, etc.

Being treated like a suspect for visiting the pharmacy without a membership card is my big gripe with Costco. However we just transferred my grandparents stuff to a better, more competent pharmacy. Now I have no gripes.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Broken_Hippo on Saturday June 03, 2017 @07:29AM (#14475900)
So you are against exploitation, yet you add a "but"? Who cares if someone else can do the job pretty readily. Anyone can be a prostitute or stripper (yeah, I know, looks and all). Some folks would argue that a 17 year old might do it better, but that's no excuse for exploitation.

"If people's regular jobs paid a "living wage", people wouldn't have to Uber, but it's how the world works." Just because some folks have to do it to get by doesn't make it right or desirable. If we can do things as a society so that people don't have to Uber just to get by - and we aren't doing it - we as a society are horrible people. And that is more where we are at now.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by zorked on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:15PM (#14471626)
> You don't think you're jumping the gun here, maybe? Do you even know what the compensation will be?

Walmart is known for high wages.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by downrightmike on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:32PM (#14471792)
Are you already zorked this early on a Friday? Then why are so many of walmart's employees on social benefits? https://www.thenation.com/article/walmart-wages-are-the-main...
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by throwanem on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:36PM (#14471825)
Sarcasm, I'm guessing.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by smileysteve on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:57PM (#14472000)
If it is, then that needs to be clarified; because for its industry and the "local" general stores it is replacing, Walmart pays more per hour.

For the Uber/Ubereats and other gig economy estimates, $11/hr is well above the industry take home.

Walmart is in progress of raising it's minimum wage to $11/hr, 22% more than federal $7.25 minimum wage. The Times covered this in the past https://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/20/business/walmart-raising-...

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by choward on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:39PM (#14471850)
Before graduating college, the most money I made was working for Walmart at a distribution center. I made $19.20 an hour which was pretty good considering minimum wage was just over $5.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by rbanffy on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:46PM (#14471917)
Can anyone actually live on $40 a day?
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Consultant32452 on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:14PM (#14472135)
At least 80% of humans live on $10 per day or less.

http://www.globalissues.org/article/26/poverty-facts-and-sta...

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by SilasX on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:20PM (#14472174)
The parent meant in the area where Walmart etc are paying that wage.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Consultant32452 on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:28PM (#14472248)
Okay, then since the Walmart employees are still alive, the answer is yes. They can live on $40/day. As an added bonus, they have a higher standard of living than the vast majority of humans on the planet.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by __jal on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:35PM (#14472310)
Well, no. If they could, they wouldn't be receiving assistance.

Walmart has turned, e.g., food assistance programs into a subsidy for themselves.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Consultant32452 on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:47PM (#14472379)
If you can imagine a world in which food assistance programs suddenly came to an end, would Wal-Mart raise its wages? Perhaps the workers would demand more. Either way, in the long run it's not possible for any employer to pay wages below the basic survival rate.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by dragonwriter on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:51PM (#14472416)
> Either way, in the long run it's not possible for any employer to pay wages below the basic survival rate.

Sure it is, if they are willing to accept more rapid turnover and the workers they are competing for have no better offers.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Consultant32452 on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:59PM (#14472476)
How long do you honestly believe an employer can sustain a business providing wages insufficient to purchase food to provide the calories necessary to complete the work?
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by __jal on Friday June 02, 2017 @04:02PM (#14472892)
You are attempting to recast the question to looking at median subsistence-rates worldwide. The Walmart workers we are discussing work in communities in the U.S.

Certainly, some folks in the world survive on $1/day. That doesn't work in the U.S.

We know that Walmart wages are insufficient alone, because workers there tell us that they need, for instance, SNAP to feed their kids.

Thus SNAP is, in part, now a subsidy to Walmart.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Consultant32452 on Friday June 02, 2017 @04:27PM (#14473041)
The point of this discussion is to shine a light on how ignorant the OP's question was. The original question was whether a person could live off $40/day. But that's not what OP really meant was it? What they meant to ask was whether or not a person could live OP's approximate standard of living on $40/day. And the answer to that is obviously not. If you make more than $34k/yr you're in the global 1%. Virtually no one on the planet lives at the OP's standard of living. The question only shows the OP's hubris.

SNAP is a subsidy for every industry that sells products that people on SNAP might purchase. Every dollar not spent on food is another dollar someone might collect in rent, or cell phone service, or clothing. Wal-Mart may benefit greatly from SNAP, but it benefits far more from its customers having more income that they don't have to spend on subsistence than it benefits from its employees being able to accept a lower wage. And of course Wal-Mart accepts SNAP payments from its customers because Wal-Mart sells groceries.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by __jal on Friday June 02, 2017 @06:05PM (#14473650)
> SNAP is a subsidy for every industry that sells products that people on SNAP might purchase

You're missing my point. SNAP is a direct subsidy to Walmart not because they sell food, but because many of their workers cannot live where they live without being enrolled in SNAP due to the low pay.

SNAP subsidizes Walmart by supplementing workers' paychecks.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by aey on Friday June 02, 2017 @08:24PM (#14474197)
It sounds like you are suggesting that wages should be set at a minimum level that is strictly above any government assistance. So if you have a job, you are disqualified from any assistance what so ever, and all the government assistance should be focused on people without jobs, essentially to bring them to that minimum.

That's similar to what welfare was like before welfare reform in 96 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_Responsibility_and_...

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Consultant32452 on Friday June 02, 2017 @09:59PM (#14474552)
I understand your point, I was just pointing you to a different perspective. Wal-Mart makes far more money from SNAP recipients as customers than it potentially saves in wages. I personally do not believe SNAP saves Wal-Mart any wages at all.

I'll circle back to the question I asked several levels ago. If SNAP suddenly disappeared, do you believe that would cause Wal-Mart to raise its wages? If not, then your point is moot since it's not saving Wal-Mart any wage costs.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by dragonwriter on Friday June 02, 2017 @03:09PM (#14472552)
That depends on how big the available labor force with no better offers is, and what the rate is at which people from outside that group move into it; potentially indefinitely, under the right (or very wrong, depending on your perspective) conditions.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Consultant32452 on Friday June 02, 2017 @03:33PM (#14472704)
I'd be interested in any examples you have.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by dllthomas on Friday June 02, 2017 @04:22PM (#14473008)
Unpaid internships?
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Consultant32452 on Friday June 02, 2017 @05:03PM (#14473296)
Well, you got me there so I gave you an upvote. Temporarily bartering labor for skills training is a complexity I hadn't accounted for.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by dllthomas on Friday June 02, 2017 @08:24PM (#14474196)
Yeah, a rather extreme example, and of course we hope they are being sufficiently well compensated in experience, though we know that's not always the case.

As another example, there's the people working 70 hour weeks across 3 jobs - no one of those is paying what's necessary to sustain the employee.

Moreover, if you're okay with high turnover, there may be people willing to work for you unsustainably for a time just to lower their burn rate.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by frgtpsswrdlame on Friday June 02, 2017 @03:08PM (#14472540)
Is walmart not proof that the answer to your question is quite a long time?
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Consultant32452 on Friday June 02, 2017 @03:31PM (#14472691)
No, and this is exactly the point I was trying to drive home when I made my original post about over 80% of the all humans living on less than $10/day. When the OP asked if "anyone can live on $40/day" what they really meant was, "Can people live a lifestyle reasonably close to mine on $40/day." The answer to that is obviously not. The question is being asked by someone who is almost certainly in the top 1% of incomes across the globe (which is about $34k/yr). But the real answer is that a person can live incredibly well by global standards on $40/day.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by eanzenberg on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:32PM (#14472280)
Irrelevant without context.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Consultant32452 on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:39PM (#14472334)
I was intentionally providing context.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by phamilton on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:12PM (#14472119)
Certainly in a place like Boise, ID. That's $800/month, $704 after tax. Rent with roommates will run around $300/month. Food is $150/month ($5/day). That leaves $250/month for misc expenditures. It would absolutely be tight, but people can and do live on that much.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by lghh on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:26PM (#14472232)
Hope you never get sick and have to call in, your car never breaks down, and you never have a medical emergency!
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by mythrwy on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:42PM (#14472350)
If you get seriously sick 3X (5 time even) that amount won't save you. But as things stand now you'd have free(ish) healthcare anyway.

Car? What car? You are walking, biking, riding the bus.

It's doable, barely, just barely and there will be troubles if anything comes up.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by rbanffy on Friday June 02, 2017 @08:30PM (#14474225)
Would that qualify as life or merely survival? Can a person under these conditions become a parent? Can someone in this situation raise a healthy kid?

I doubt it.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by mythrwy on Saturday June 03, 2017 @12:18AM (#14474986)
No, you can't have a kid on this money. Nor is it a very good life in terms of material possessions. You probably can't afford a horse either.

But none of those things were specified in OP's post.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by rbanffy on Saturday June 03, 2017 @09:56AM (#14476394)
That's more or less what it meant - a meaningful, healthy life, above merely survival. I would know - I'm the OP.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by mythrwy on Saturday June 03, 2017 @02:36PM (#14477732)
Ah yes, indeed you are. I had to go further up the tree it appears.

I don't disagree. Not a good life.

People live on a buck here and there and change they find in vending machines as far as a "living" goes. Technically they are "alive" but it can't be nice way to live.

Kind of makes one wonder exactly what level of "living" is acceptable. I suppose preferences vary.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by knightofmars on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:35PM (#14472308)
What if you have a family?
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by phamilton on Friday June 02, 2017 @04:14PM (#14472956)
It raises some interesting questions. Should every job pay a sufficient wage to raise a family? How big of a family? Should we require employers to pay a teenager as much as someone supporting a family of 8?
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by bluGill on Friday June 02, 2017 @03:00PM (#14472482)
Food goes up a little bit, and your room is more crowded. Everything else is the same.

Go look at the size of a log cabin, they were about the size of a single bedroom today and large families lived in them.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by gknoy on Friday June 02, 2017 @03:36PM (#14472718)
> [if you have a family] Food goes up a little bit, and your room is more crowded. Everything else is the same.

The amount of money and extra time that we spent on just one baby was astounding - clothes, doctor visits, food. Many more trips to the store/pharmacy/doctor, etc, than normal.

The USDA's child cost estimator [0] says that raising a child in the midwest costs about an extra $12000 a year, on average. Not all of that breakdown may apply, but even if you were to ONLY look at food costs, an extra $1500/year in food (when you're only making the hypothetical $800/month discussed in the GP) is not "a little".

0: https://www.cnpp.usda.gov/tools/crc_calculator/

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by bluGill on Friday June 02, 2017 @05:32PM (#14473475)
My wife is great at scrounging: kids didn't add much to my costs unless we are eating out. You can get last years styles all over for cheap. My kids can have a few stains - they will be putting their own on anyway.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by icebraining on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:51PM (#14472408)
Hopefully you have a second wage earner in it.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by smileysteve on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:02PM (#14472042)
The poster's point is that $19.20 is significantly above the federal minimum wage and what Walmart is legally required to pay.

I want to emphasize in this context (gig delivery) that the recent UberEats Stockholm posting indicated even less than $5/hr.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by bluGill on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:58PM (#14472464)
Yes. Most people want a higher standard of living, but if you live in a small enough apartment, walk everywhere, cook your own meals, have only minimal utilities (your furnace exists for the pipes not for your comfort)... it can be done.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by s73ver on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:22PM (#14472194)
Distribution center is different than in store associates.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by x0x0 on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:26PM (#14471728)
If only we had some patterns of previous behavior towards employees at Walmart from which we could make inferences about whether the deal offered (well, eventually, this will be "offered" to employees, ie totally optional, unless you want to keep your job) will be a fair deal or exploitative.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by atom-morgan on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:28PM (#14471753)
I made a few dollars above minimum wage when I was 18 before I started college. Not much on my resume other than similar jobs expected of someone in highschool. I was very happy with my job there.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by v45h on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:09PM (#14471551)
Is it only shady because you believe Walmart employees are not paid enough as is?

Doctors can choose to moonlight and get paid extra, and I don't think anyone is complaining about that. And overtime is certainly a thing.

Coming from Walmart's perspective, I'm assuming it just seemed like a smart business decision rather than something maliciously intended. Like hey look, we can make our customers and employees happier in a profitable manner thereby keeping up with our competitor (Amazon).

If the employees have complaints about this then I guess perhaps it can be called into question. But at the end of the day won't most employees be happy about this?

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Chaebixi on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:30PM (#14471778)
> Coming from Walmart's perspective, I'm assuming it just seemed like a smart business decision rather than something maliciously intended.

I think that's exactly what the parent comment was criticizing:

>> Ugh. I think that this sort of attitude (which was my initial reaction too) is a big part of what's wrong with our current economy.

To restate: what's wrong with our economy is that we evaluate things, first and foremost, on if they're a "smart business decision" or not. That leads to "smart business decisions" are shady when looked at from many other perspectives.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by ghostly_s on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:20PM (#14471670)
> Doctors can choose to moonlight and get paid extra, and I don't think anyone is complaining about that.

Doctors have that choice, and yet they don't do that. I wonder why?

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by potatoyogurt on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:27PM (#14471749)
>In Medical Economics’ 2013 annual survey, 36% of family medicine/general practitioners and 35% of internists reported earning income from sources other than their primary practice/employer in 2012. That number was about the same for cardiologists (38%), but was higher for hospitalists (40%). Pediatricians and gastroenterologists were lower, at 25% and 27%, respectively.

http://medicaleconomics.modernmedicine.com/medical-economics...

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by alistairSH on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:04PM (#14472062)
Unless I missed it, that report doesn't indicate the total hours worked, only rates at which doctors perform work outside their primary clinical job.

There is also a massive difference between a doctor taking a side job because they enjoy it and a WalMart associate taking a delivery job because they have no choice.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by phamilton on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:16PM (#14472144)
> 35% of internists reported earning income from sources other than their primary practice

> There is also a massive difference between a doctor taking a side job because they enjoy it and a WalMart associate taking a delivery job because they have no choice.

I suggest you become more familiar with what medical interns get paid and their lifestyle. They are certainly moonlighting to pay the bills.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by alistairSH on Friday June 02, 2017 @03:40PM (#14472747)
I doubt interns are moonlighting anywhere, as they don't have the accreditation to do so.

Perhaps you mean residents? The article discusses their options and does mention they might look for the extra income to pay down loans.

Regardless, the average salary for a family physician in the US somewhere around $175,000. Most specialists earn more. Yes, they can make poor financial choices and end up needing extra income, but at those income levels, I have to assume most of them are doing it for "fun".

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by mtberatwork on Friday June 02, 2017 @03:39PM (#14472740)
Internist as in "internal medicine", not as in "unpaid intern".
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by alistairSH on Friday June 02, 2017 @03:45PM (#14472785)
In the US, we have medical interns. They have completed their classroom studies, but not yet started residencies. They typically work as poorly paid interns for 18 months(?), doing quick rotations through the various specialties, before moving on to their residencies.

They are paid poorly. I think the base rate is about $35k/year. But, at this point, they are still effectively students. I believe the MD is granted upon completion of the internship (or maybe they have the MD, but not the license to practice, I can never remember).

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by ghostly_s on Tuesday June 06, 2017 @10:44AM (#14497582)
Ugh. Internist is not a synonym for intern, unpaid or otherwise. An 'internist' is a sub-specialty of fully-licensed medical doctor, as in 'internal medicine'. It's equivalent to a pediatrician except specifically focused on care for adult patients, in contrast to a 'family practice' or 'general practice' doctor, who focuses on both adult and pediatric patients.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by HeyLaughingBoy on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:17PM (#14472156)
There's also a massive difference between a doctor taking a side job because they have no choice and a Walmart associate taking a delivery job because they enjoy it.

Don't assume!

Everyone assumes doctors are these fabulously rich people when many of them don't make a whole lot of money when considered on an hours-worked basis.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by HarryHirsch on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:43PM (#14472358)
The poor creatures! Between their Mercedes-Benzes and their 5000 sqft houses (don't underestimate heating and cooling for that amount of enclosed space!) and the private schools for their kids and the cruise holidays to Madagaskar there is hardly any money left at the end of the month.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Consultant32452 on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:16PM (#14472149)
Before this program was created they didn't have a choice. Now they do.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by ghostly_s on Tuesday June 06, 2017 @11:18AM (#14497887)
I'm pretty skeptical of the level to which they've dived into these results. 43% of the respondents said they receive supplemental income from "other medical" work. There exists a massive network of funding backed by pharmaceutical companies which essentially launders money into the pockets of physicians through things like highly-paid consultancy roles, speaking engagements, etc. Ostensibly these types of things would be covered by the 'speaking engagement' and 'consulting' categories, but the low figures there do not jive with my anecdotal knowledge of the field so I'm not really willing to accept these self-reported results as accurate considering that massive "other" result.

Just looking at the figures as presented, it seems the average rate of moonlighting is in the range of 34%, and of the types of moonlighting reported, I'd only characterize about 37% as direct medical practice. So that adds up to 13% of practitioners who are actually practicing medicine somewhere else in their free time. Not unheard of, but far from the norm, so I stand by my point. The great majority of doctors are not picking up shifts somewhere else, because the great majority of them don't need the extra income.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by xienze on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:50PM (#14471948)
To add to that, a lot of doctors at urgent care clinics (after hours, at least) are moonlighting.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by briandear on Friday June 02, 2017 @03:13PM (#14472584)
That just isn't true at all. In fact, it's patently false.

https://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/12/24/the-doctor-as-moon...

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by smileysteve on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:04PM (#14472058)
Beyond Doctors, a lot of software engineers are highly paid and moonlight as well.

Or startup founders driving for uber.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by frik on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:35PM (#14472303)
> Or startup founders driving for uber.

So it really happens? I though it was joke in "Silicon Valley" TV series S04E01.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by EpicEng on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:07PM (#14472080)
Well I guess just making things up is one approach to debate, eh?
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by ianai on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:02PM (#14471475)
Yes, exactly. I could imagine an after-shift delivery taking up to an hour to complete. (I'm factoring-in "find the place" time and retracing their steps after delivery) They will probably only be paid a per Diem for the delivery - and it won't be near their hourly wage nor gas/wear & tear costs.

It's a nice thought on the outside...but ultimately, deliveries are best done by actually specialized outfits.

I can also imagine a manager changing everyones' schedules around the deliveries. That could seriously impact people.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by xienze on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:07PM (#14471527)
> and it won't be near their hourly wage nor gas/wear & tear costs.

Well then, I suppose the people involved will just have to do the math and see if it makes sense to them. The horror.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by rgbrenner on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:18PM (#14471647)
Im in the 'wait and see' camp.. but you can say a program is voluntary, while in truth it's required to keep your job.

Just label all the people who refuse as not being team players. Dock them on their performance reviews for it. "Johnny over there wouldn't take a short detour on his way home, so we had to send someone out to deliver a package. If he's not willing to help out, maybe he should go work some place else."

There.. a required voluntary program. This is the natural language/playbook for every manager out there.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by x0x0 on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:27PM (#14471743)
Many of the workers involved have hours that change on the whim of their supervisors. Employees who aren't team players don't get hours.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by briandear on Friday June 02, 2017 @03:14PM (#14472594)
Do you have any evidence at all that this will be the case here?
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by rgbrenner on Friday June 02, 2017 @03:36PM (#14472720)
I was speaking generally... but I think its going to be pretty difficult to avoid in an organization like Walmart, with its low-margin and strong emphasis on efficiency and controlling costs, to look at a sheet that says an employee is 2 minutes from a delivery point, but instead we had to send a truck 30 minutes out to deliver a package... it's going to be hard for that manager not to take that as a willingness to help.

Once you have a sheet with times and delivery points for each employee.. it becomes a measure of the employees willingness to assist. If other employees are willing to drive 10 minutes, and you're not willing to drive 2 minutes, it raises the question of why.

And that question is definitely going to be asked if the alternative (30 minutes for regular delivery) results in an additional cost to the company.

But as I said, we'll have to wait and see.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by ThrustVectoring on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:18PM (#14471650)
When the alternative is starving, taking a worse deal is just what you have to do. And Walmart controls the workers hours, so that's a huge mess.

This can become abusive in a hurry. Suppose the net after gas is that delivering packages pays $5/hr. Walmart knows how many deliveries their workers take, how many they need, and what hours get scheduled. More packages need going out? Cut hours for folks not delivering, schedule the folks delivering for more days with short shifts or split shifts.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by subway on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:14PM (#14471619)
Sadly for a lot of people, the short term win of being able to use the extra couple dollars to feed the family causes them to act 'irrationally' and ignore the longer term consequences.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Alupis on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:20PM (#14471671)
> Sadly for a lot of people, the short term win of being able to use the extra couple dollars to feed the family causes them to act 'irrationally' and ignore the longer term consequences

Sort of like driving for Lyft or Uber?

The wear on vehicles alone adds up quickly into large maintenance bills... yet many people still drive for them on an amateur level, making long term profits questionable (buying new tires after 1-2 years instead of 3-4, for example).

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by rbanffy on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:51PM (#14471953)
And when it doesn't, the manager will see their bonuses going away and the workers will be labeled non-team-players, their performance reviews will be harsher and some slackers will have to go to make room for dedicated people.

Labor unions, when they work, are a beautiful thing.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by 1_2__3 on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:21PM (#14471682)
It's sad reading people cheering their own exploitation. But I'd expect nothing less from HN.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by r00fus on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:34PM (#14471816)
You think the average HN employee works shifts at Wal-mart? No, it's people here cheering other's exploitation (in the name of the mythical "freedom").
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by xienze on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:49PM (#14471934)
You're both assuming that this must necessarily be exploitative. It might actually be a good program for Walmart workers.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by r00fus on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:17PM (#14472157)
And your assumption that employee is even allowed a cost/benefit option is based on... ?

All of this hypothetical except for the fact that Wal-Mart is known for a) ruthless schedule management like keeping workers locked in warehouses b) a known price-cutter both on vendors and employees to the point their employees often qualify for state aid for under-employed / under-paid (i.e., welfare benefits).

Given that, it'd be surprising if an non-exploitative option will be available for the workers who will be doing these deliveries.

But of course, we'll see.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by xienze on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:23PM (#14472204)
> And your assumption that employee is even allowed a cost/benefit option is based on... ?

I'm not assuming anything, I'm giving Walmart the benefit of the doubt. As you said, "we'll see", no need to shit on them providing their employees with an additional revenue stream before the program is even implemented.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by r00fus on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:33PM (#14472290)
Giving Wal-Mart the benefit of the doubt flies in the face of historical facts/data. Feel free to argue otherwise.

Let's keep it civil.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by voidlogic on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:55PM (#14472440)
Are you operating on old assumptions? The average hourly wage is $13.38 for full-time workers and $10.58 per hour for part-timers [1]. Not bad for unskilled labor.

1: http://money.cnn.com/2016/01/20/news/companies/walmart-pay-r...

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by TillE on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:05PM (#14472063)
Any situation where you do not receive the full value of your labor is exploitation, of course.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exploitation_of_labour#Surplus...

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by ericd on Friday June 02, 2017 @04:36PM (#14473109)
Is this sarcasm? "Of course" makes it sound like it is, because it's certainly not obvious, but you know, Poe's law, and you linked to it.

If it's not, I'm curious why this theory holds so much sway for some people, given its glaring flaws. Maybe I'm just misunderstanding what it's saying, but just because an engineer can add $1M in marginal revenue to Google's bottom line absolutely does not mean they deserve $1M in salary, because they can only do that using the construct that was created by the other engineers at Google in order to make that much money for Google. If they couldn't make that $1M on their own without the rest of Google's help - the existing brand, infrastructure, and ideas when they join - they're not being "exploited", especially if they're also shareholders. And the longer you spend there, the larger a shareholder you become (unless you choose to sell your share to someone else, which many do).

And to say that the value of a product can be based on how much labor it took to make is completely insane - mud piles can take tons of labor to make, but they're usually also completely useless. The amount of effort expended did not imbue those mud piles with any sort of value to anyone.

This isn't to say that I think the current ownership structures of companies is ideal and can't be improved upon, I don't think that. But I find what you linked to be filled with such flawed reasoning that I'm curious what people see in it. Or maybe it requires operating under different axioms.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by xienze on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:09PM (#14472091)
Again, you're saying this without even knowing what the pay structure is.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by s73ver on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:24PM (#14472218)
Walmart has not earned that benefit of the doubt. Given that it is Walmart, the default is to assume that it will be exploitative until proven otherwise.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by ianai on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:37PM (#14472321)
I've only heard good things about Costco. I wouldn't give Costco the benefit of the doubt. Every company (except nonprofits) exists to accrue profit. There's no other factor. They do not have any interest in mind than profit. I definitely assume the worst from Walmart.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by makmanalp on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:12PM (#14471590)
Which also doesn't help if it ends up being coercive like "well this is optional, but we'll prefer people who do it" effectively meaning people who don't do it will just get passed over for promotions / raises etc.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by smileysteve on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:12PM (#14472118)
> They will probably only be paid a per Diem for the delivery

This is a big assumption we'll have to find out. It's important to state that delivery competitors UberEats, Roadie, etc are also per diem. (and come with fewer benefits than a walmart employee would already have)

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Alupis on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:13PM (#14471603)
> I could imagine an after-shift delivery taking up to an hour to complete.

The article says the app finds possible deliveries that are on the employee's route home, so no extra out of the way driving is to be done... only a 30 second stop to get out and carry the package up to the front door. Seems very efficient to me.

> I can also imagine a manager changing everyones' schedules around the deliveries. That could seriously impact people.

Again, from the article, the program is 100% volunteer.

> but ultimately, deliveries are best done by actually specialized outfits

Which are incapable of same day deliveries usually (there's a few exceptions, but they usually cost a figurative arm and leg). Typically local courier services are used (such as with Amazon's same day deliveries, but note that Amazon subsidizes that service and the customer doesn't pay the actual cost typically), but they are making a special trip to pickup the package and a special trip to deliver the package, which means it costs more to WalMart, which means WalMart passes that cost onto the customer.

Seems like this program can be a big win-win for everyone involved. We'll have to wait and see how the trial run goes.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Chaebixi on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:46PM (#14471915)
> The article says the app finds possible deliveries that are on the employee's route home, so no extra out of the way driving is to be done... only a 30 second stop to get out and carry the package up to the front door. Seems very efficient to me.

Dude, you're engaging in fantasy. Walmart is going to want to use this for more people than just those who live on busy commuter roads that happen to be used by a Walmart employee. "On the employee's route home" is probably going to mean a detour below some limit that Walmart decides. Also, it only takes 30 seconds to deliver a package if it's small and you know exactly what house it's meant for, both of which are unlikely to be true in the real world. It regularly takes more than 30 seconds just to hunt for an unfamiliar house number.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by briandear on Friday June 02, 2017 @03:16PM (#14472602)
Any evidence to support your claims?
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Chaebixi on Friday June 02, 2017 @05:12PM (#14473342)
> Any evidence to support your claims?

Evidence that it would typically take more than 30 seconds to drop off a package to an unfamiliar house, even on a route you know? Or that Walmart is motivated to ship to people who aren't directly on its employee's commutes, and it likely will use this to do so if it goes forward with this idea?

My evidence is common sense. If you'd like a time-motion study, or a recording from Walmart's boardroom conversations, you're out of luck. Anyway, the stronger claims are those I was disputing, which don't pass the smell test.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Alupis on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:55PM (#14471982)
> is probably going to mean a detour below some limit that Walmart decides

Did you miss the part where this is a voluntary program? If the employee doesn't like the route, they don't have to take it.

> Dude, you're engaging in fantasy

I suppose it's fantasy simply because you hate Walmart (I presume). If this was, say, Amazon... I wager most would take a different opinion. "Look at how ingenuitive Amazon is! They'll deliver packages even faster and cheaper, and pay employees more while they're at it!"

You have no idea what the compensation is, but immediately assume it's big bad Walmart beating up on poor employees. Many just immediately assume this is some new devilish ploy to exploit workers... that's absurd, especially given how few facts we have about this program so far.

The facts, so far, state this is a 100% volunteer program... will only suggest package deliveries along the employees current (and specified by the employee) route home... and the employee will be compensated for that delivery above their normal wage... and Walmart will pass the savings to the customer, and offer faster delivery.

How is this not a win based on what we know so far? It's pure conjecture and bias that leads to the default assumption this is some absurdly evil, exploitative scheme...

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Chaebixi on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:21PM (#14472186)
> Did you miss the part where this is a voluntary program? If the employee doesn't like the route, they don't have to take it.

There are all kinds of comments in other threads talking about how "voluntary" it may end up being in practice.

> I suppose it's fantasy simply because you hate Walmart (I presume)....

You presume quite a bit, and your presumptions border on fantasy.

> The facts, so far, state this is a 100% volunteer program...

> and the employee will be compensated for that delivery above their normal wage...

Correction: the company PR so far, this is all based on a Walmart blog post. Anyway, let's play quote the OP:

>>> Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is testing a program...

>>> Wal-Mart didn’t specify how the employees will be compensated.

You're right that it's all-volunteer now, but it's reasonable to question how much that will remain true in the future, especially since it's still being developed. It could even turn out to be de-jure voluntary but de-facto mandatory. Walmart could also shower money on its employees for this work, but history suggests otherwise.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by penpapersw on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:11PM (#14471573)
Most of our local friends work at Walmart, because there's honestly not much other choice for them.

Our economy is so broken that the only people who win are people who know how to abuse the system, and who have designed the system to be easier to abuse and harder to survive by honest hard work.

I read once that Walmart uses their resources to take advantage of current (broken) laws to allow them to keep paying pennies for hard work, and forcing the government to pay the rest of a living wage. (Most of our friends are also receiving at least one or two forms of public aid.) I wouldn't be surprised if they also use their resources to "influence" laws to ensure that it stays this way.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by wutbrodo on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:57PM (#14472004)
> I read once that Walmart uses their resources to take advantage of current (broken) laws to allow them to keep paying pennies for hard work, and forcing the government to pay the rest of a living wage.

I have never understood this complaint. I'm 100% onboard with the idea that, in a society as affluent as ours, no one should be going hungry, unhoused, etc. But how is that not our collective responsibility, as opposed to the responsibility of an entity who happens to be buying their labor?

The idea that Walmart is "forcing" the government to take care of poorer citizens is frankly idiotic: if you accept that there is a responsibility to take care of the poor (as I do), that responsibility is on all of us, and the government is the canonical expression of our collective will and action. Trying to shirk this responsibility by desperately shoe-horning it into the labor market is just a messy hack (the same is true of the idea that employers should be the de facto providers of health insurance, as opposed to the gov't). I can't help but think that people who think that this is somehow the ethical approach have a status-quo bias as a poor substitute for actual moral reasoning.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by grasshopperpurp on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:31PM (#14472276)
You don't understand why someone would complain that a mega-rich corporation is increasing its own wealth by refusing to pay a living wage, which then requires everyone else - not profiting on this person's labor - to make up the difference?

I don't know how you get, 'Everyone else is turning their backs on the poor and forcing Walmart to take care of them' from 'Walmart should pay their employees a living wage.'

The only other alternative would be to drastically increase social services and tax people - like the Waltons - a LOT more.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by wutbrodo on Saturday June 03, 2017 @06:12AM (#14475701)
> You don't understand why someone would complain that a mega-rich corporation is increasing its own wealth by refusing to pay a living wage, which then requires everyone else - not profiting on this person's labor - to make up the difference?

It seems like you've completely failed to understand any of my comment. I'm taking issue with the entire construction of the claim you're making. If I buy a guy's used car from him on Craigslist, and he doesn't have a job and that was his only income that year, am I "increasing my own wealth by refusing to pay him enough to live, which then requires everyone else to make up the difference"? No, and your claim makes as little sense as that one does.

My whole point is that I've never heard an argument for loading the purchase of labor with the responsibility for arbitrary parts of the seller's life. The only arguments I've ever heard in support of it (like yours) are just a poor excuse to shrug off the responsibility that society owes to its citizens.

> The only other alternative would be to drastically increase social services and tax people - like the Waltons - a LOT more.

Well _duh_. That's entirely my point. And it makes infinitely more sense to target governmental revenue intentionally (ie through a progressive tax code) than to resort to the current messy workaround and all the distortions of the labor market that it implies.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by s73ver on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:31PM (#14472272)
Because that is Walmart shoving their costs onto the rest of us. I'm glad that the social safety net exists, but a company that requires the rest of us to pick up their slack quite frankly should not exist. If they are not capable of paying their employees a living wage, then they are not a viable business.

I honestly cannot see how anyone can consider subsidizing a massively profitable multi billion dollar business is an "ethical approach".

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Houshalter on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:26PM (#14471727)
That's surprising. In the past walmart has supported increases in the minimum wage because they know it hurts their competitors more than it hurts them. They shove the cost of higher wages off to higher prices for consumers and keep the same profit.

In any case within a few years these jobs will likely be automated, and walmart will stop hurting all those poor employees.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by mtberatwork on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:42PM (#14471879)
Walmart has acquiesced to increases in minimum wages only under protest from their workers and even then, the increases were pitiful. [1]

[1] http://www.cnbc.com/2016/06/03/walmart-can-afford-15-minimum...

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Houshalter on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:19PM (#14472167)
Walmart raising it's own wages voluntarily is different than supporting a law that forces all companies to raise wages.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by mtberatwork on Friday June 02, 2017 @03:42PM (#14472764)
Walmart raising its own wages under protest is different than Walmart raising them voluntarily.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by dominotw on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:30PM (#14471772)
>forcing the government to pay the rest of a living wage.

What difference does it make where the money is coming from?

If we force Walmart to pay more, low-income ppl who shop will have to pay higher prices as opposed to now where all the taxpayers are footing the bill.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by timthelion on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:41PM (#14471871)
utter nonsense. Walmart makes 131 BILLION dollars a year in pure profit [1]. Obviuosly, forcing walmart to pay their employees more could lead to them making less profit and the poor being better off.

EDIT: Basically there is no correlation between walmart's costs and how much the consumer pays.

[1] http://www.wikinvest.com/stock/Wal-Mart_(WMT)/Data/Gross_Pro...

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by xienze on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:53PM (#14471976)
The page you linked doesn't tell the whole story:

http://www.marketwatch.com/investing/stock/wmt/financials

The ~100+ billion number is revenue - cost of goods. Actual profit after _all_ expenses is around ~13 billion or so. Big number? Yes, but only around 3-4% profit margin. And it's been declining.

Walmart has 2.3 million employees. $13 billion doesn't make for huge pay increases when you've got that many people to cover.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by ruste on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:03PM (#14472046)
Gross profit. Not Net profit. They made a tenth of that after all other costs are considered. [1] 13.6 billion spread over 2.1 million employees works out to about a $6500 per year raise or about $3.10 per hour given 2087 working hours in a year before they're in the red. It'd help a bit, but nothing life changing. You're vastly overestimating their ability to raise wages without raising prices.

[1]http://www.marketwatch.com/investing/stock/wmt/financials

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by timthelion on Saturday June 03, 2017 @01:46PM (#14477479)
Are you sure that a 35% increase in sallary wouldn't be life changing for a person making 18k a year? https://www.glassdoor.com/Hourly-Pay/Walmart-Sales-Associate...
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by dominotw on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:58PM (#14472012)
>forcing walmart to pay their employees more could lead to them making less profit and the poor being better off.

What's stopping them from passing on costs to consumers, given they have eliminated all competition in large parts of the country.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by timthelion on Friday June 02, 2017 @03:51PM (#14472832)
The same thing stopping them from rasing prices right away without any change in the law.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by dominotw on Friday June 02, 2017 @08:19PM (#14474168)
walmart and target pay the same wages.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by timthelion on Saturday June 03, 2017 @05:48PM (#14478686)
How does that effect the conversation?
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by penpapersw on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:39PM (#14471860)
For one thing, sometimes you can't get it when you need it. In our area, there's an 8 year waiting list on housing assistance.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Chaebixi on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:58PM (#14472016)
>> ...Walmart uses their resources to take advantage of current (broken) laws to...pay...pennies...and forc[e]...the government to pay the rest of a living wage.

> What difference does it make where the money is coming from?

Because taxpayers are subsidizing Walmart's business, for one. That's unacceptable, especially if the subsidy is the result of conscious policy on Walmart's part.

> If we force Walmart to pay more, low-income ppl who shop will have to pay higher prices as opposed to now where all the taxpayers are footing the bill.

They will also get paid more to pay those prices, and the taxpayers will not longer be subsidizing Walmart's profits (if the grandparent is correct).

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by smileysteve on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:09PM (#14472090)
> Because taxpayers are subsidizing Walmart's business

We can assume then that taxpayers are subsidizing all businesses with employees making under $11 and hour, so why isn't the government changing minimum wage laws from $7.25/hr and $2.35/hr

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Chaebixi on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:27PM (#14472245)
There's something especially slimy about the #1 company in the Fortune 500 consciously doing it. And by it, I mean pay its employees so little they need to go on welfare, and then directing them to the welfare office.

> so why isn't the government changing minimum wage laws from $7.25/hr and $2.35/hr

Because it's been captured by people who like to pay their employees as little as possible.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by smileysteve on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:30PM (#14472264)
Slimy about consciously, doing what? Paying a minimum of 122% of what they are legally required to? Paying an average of 191% of what they're legally required to?

[If nearly doubling "expectations" is slimy, what does it take to exceed expectations]

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Chaebixi on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:36PM (#14472315)
You're confusing legality with ethics and morality. You can behave can quite unethically and immorally while still meeting or exceeding legal requirements.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by voidlogic on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:34PM (#14471807)
>Instead of paying their employees a living wage

Are you operating on old assumptions? The average hourly wage is $13.38 for full-time workers and $10.58 per hour for part-timers [1]. While that might not get you far in the bay area (which doesn't have many Walmarts FWIW), its a pretty good wage for unskilled labor in much of the interior country (which is prime Walmart territory)...

1: http://money.cnn.com/2016/01/20/news/companies/walmart-pay-r...

Edit: Sorry, when I said bay area I was thinking of the area immediately surrounding San Francisco.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by dragonwriter on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:00PM (#14472024)
> While that might not get you far in the bay area (which doesn't have Walmarts FWIW)

The Bay Area has, from a quick Google search and review of the list of locations, something like 25 Wal-Marts, which is substantially more than zero.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by greglindahl on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:51PM (#14471954)
The Bay Area doesn't have Walmarts? Mountain View, Santa Clara, 4 in San Jose, Milpitas, Fremont, and that's just in the South Bay.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by voidlogic on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:22PM (#14472199)
Sorry, I'm not from the area, I was thinking of the area immediately around SF on the lower peninsula.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by russdpale on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:49PM (#14471935)
You could be totally right, but honestly this whole idea sounds like something a union would do. I don't wonder if this is to throw the employees a bone, in hopes of staving off employees trying to unionize.

My main worry is the safety. Who is controlling how many hours are worked? This may not seem safety related at first, but many state DOT's might have a problem with 8 hour shift employees then going and working 5+ more hours on the road. What is the safety oversight? For UPS, Fedex, etc, there are state guidelines about how many hours they can drive consecutively in a day, in a week, so on and so forth. Are these employees going to have to get a DOT health certification (checking vision and such)?

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by qmarchi on Saturday June 03, 2017 @02:20AM (#14475262)
The system is designed to only minorly adjust the route taken on the way back to the associates place of residence.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by wyc on Friday June 02, 2017 @12:57PM (#14471418)
Wouldn't this result in increased risk of delivery failure, package damage, or even non-professional delivery-driver injury? If anything, this is low-end, but yes, it sounds cheap.

I think it'd be a good practice to examine competitive offerings for delivery per area, e.g., offerings such as Postmates and similar. If there's someone willing to pay them more, then I feel that the employee may have enough options for fair treatment. However, if Walmart is the only game in town, then I agree with a lot of your apprehensions.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by danvoell on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:07PM (#14471517)
Also, the fact that it is tied to employment could also be a pitfall. It's optional, until such point as it isn't. At least with other types of sharing economy type jobs it is optional. What happens when you feel obligated to make deliveries so as to not lose your day job.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by adventured on Friday June 02, 2017 @03:10PM (#14472561)
If you want Walmart to pay a "living wage" for the bottom 50% of their employees - then you're asking Walmart to fire a million people in the next decade.

Walmart's net income has been declining for years. Their sales have topped out. Their margins are razor thin. Amazon is beginning to cut deeply into their business. Some non-trivial percentage of Amazon's growth over the next ten years must come directly from Walmart.

Walmart is in trouble, Sears style circa 1990. And you want them to raise wages significantly when they already can't afford the employee base they have. Good luck.

How does this sound instead? Fire a million workers, try to get the sales to employee ratio closer to Costco by automating anything and everything they can. Then raise the salaries modestly of the remaining million employees that are higher value labor. Then the fired million people become 100% subsidized by tax payers because there are no jobs for them and are not going to be. Nothing can stop some variation of that scenario from happening, the only thing slowing it down is the low cost of the labor in question. Raise that cost, Walmart will be forced to accelerate the employee reduction as their net income continues to contract.

Your sole choice re Walmart & a living wage, is full government subsidization of the low skill employees, or partial. Besides, Canada, Australia and every European welfare state uses a public subsidization system for low value labor: the top 50% pay for the welfare (healthcare et al) for the bottom 50% that do not earn much (who do you think is paying for the welfare costs of France's perpetually high unemployment rate?). If you take a job in the UK making minimum wage, you are not covering the cost of all of your benefits such as healthcare, and the UK has a relatively low corporate income tax rate, who do you think is subsidizing that low pay rate on the labor? This is common all over the developed world.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by ancap on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:10PM (#14471565)
Wow, way to take something that would be a win-win for Walmart, its employees and consumers and turn it into some dark scheme.

>Instead of paying their employees a living wage

Walmart (and any other employer) doesn't arbitrarily pick wages. They pay the market rate which is no more than the employee's marginal productivity. This is why Walmart was offering entry level employees $17+/hour in North Dakota during the height of the fracking boom.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by x0x0 on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:31PM (#14471784)
The market rate is unrelated to marginal productivity, unless you think North Dakota Walmart employees are twice as productive as Walmart employees elsewhere.

Walmart is, in many markets, a big enough employer in the low skills employment marketplace to be a price setter not a price taker.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by ancap on Friday June 02, 2017 @03:30PM (#14472682)
I think you misunderstood what I was saying. To state the same thing differently: They pay the market rate which is less than or equal to the employee's marginal productivity, or, an employer is not going to pay someone more than their marginal productivity.

> unless you think North Dakota Walmart employees are twice as productive as Walmart employees elsewhere.

No, not at all. Walmart was merely paying the market rate. It's important to recognize that at some point with fewer workers the per-employee marginal productivity increases--a kind of inverse way of talking about diminishing returns. You can be sure that the Walmart in North Dakota paying $17+/hour was not hiring nearly as many workers as a Walmart paying people $8/hour.

EDIT: I want to add one more thing. Not only would the $17/hour Walmart not be hiring as many people as the $8/hour Walmart, but they're also going to have a lower over-all productivity rate unless the $17/hour workers had their labor complemented by additional technology. The cost of purchasing the additional technology is price prohibitive until labor costs rise.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by pmiller2 on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:50PM (#14471952)
Yep, and if they happen to get in an accident on the way to a delivery, guess who pays? Not the employee's insurance, unless they have commercial coverage, and I'm guessing not Walmart.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by dheera on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:50PM (#14471942)
As long as Walmart doesn't indirectly force people to participate, I don't see a problem.

By indirectly force, I mean, "you will effectively get fired for some BS reason like poor performance if you don't do some deliveries and take the meager compensation" type stuff.

I for one rarely go directly home after work. I have other things I like to do in the evenings before going home. I don't want work telling me I need to do otherwise.

It emphatically needs to be voluntary.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by cat199 on Saturday June 03, 2017 @12:43AM (#14475047)
Nah, walmart finance inc will sell you a nice auto loan no probs.. you'll get a real good deal.. I'll make you an offer you can't refuse
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by pavement on Friday June 02, 2017 @12:58PM (#14471432)
In other words, knowing what we already know about Wal Mart, while this might be good news for share holders, this isn't likely to be good news for employees.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by williamle8300 on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:45PM (#14471913)
It says they can "opt in"... why are you criticizing this?

And yes, they can also "opt in" whether to find a new job, and quit Walmart.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Zarath on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:02PM (#14472043)
True, but I'd bet those that choose to opt in are more likely to get raises/promotions and create a vicious cycle where it's still opt in but everyone basically needs it to stay competitive (smartphone, car, etc.)
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by williamle8300 on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:48PM (#14472384)
If you think your employer is crooked, then... quit?

I can't do everything for you. This is basic life skills.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by gregw134 on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:07PM (#14471516)
Walmart has less than 3% profit margin. It'd go bankrupt if it paid its employees $15/hour.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by ransom1538 on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:23PM (#14471703)
If walmart can't support a decent wage - then they should go bankrupt and let middle class persons own and run small businesses: hardware stores, grocery stores, clothing stores, ice cream stores, etc. Owning a business near a walmart means competing with floods of cheap off loaded goods from china -- operated by persons using government subsidies.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Houshalter on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:37PM (#14471839)
It's more like the other way around. Small businesses are much more sensitive to increases in wages than big efficient companies like walmart. That's why Walmart has supported increases in the minimum wage in the past, because they know it hurts their competitors more than them. They just increase their prices and put the increased costs onto consumers and keep the same profit.

But even if it wasn't this way, so what? Walmart isn't making their employees worse off. They are giving them low skill jobs that the economy is desperately short on. Companies like Apple hire orders of magnitude less low skill employees relative to their profit than Walmart.

No one is protesting Apple over that. If we just taxed companies like that bit more, and distributed the money amongst the poor, it would be vastly more effective than making walmart pay a few percent more. In a few years Walmart will automate most of their jobs anyways. As many industries already have. Increasing the minimum wage doesn't solve that.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by greglindahl on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:12PM (#14472120)
If you compare Costco to Sam's Club, you'll notice that it's not that simple.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by qmarchi on Saturday June 03, 2017 @02:23AM (#14475267)
Costco doesn't have customer service. I can walk around and never see a single person.

At Sam's, I'm constantly bombarded with questions of if I need help.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by smileysteve on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:16PM (#14472150)
Another post indicates that they already pay hourly employees $13.85 average.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by refurb on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:59PM (#14472477)
What? This is completely voluntary. If an employee looks at the extra pay and says "no thanks". Nothing happens.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Stanleyc23 on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:32PM (#14471799)
interesting perspective. my first impression was that this was a v1 test for getting into the on demand delivery business that Postmates is in right now.
[dead]
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Houshalter on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:16PM (#14471639)
I feel exactly the opposite. It feels like HN is very liberal. I'd bet money it's much more than the general population.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by Fraterkes on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:27PM (#14471744)
Its not like everyone is perfectly left or right. Hn is probably pretty socially liberal and kinda economically liberal on some points, but its also a big fan of companies and has a lot more people with libertarian ideas than the general population.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by twoquestions on Friday June 02, 2017 @01:57PM (#14472009)
Libertarian isn't necessarily right-wing, even though it generally is in the US.

When you get some time, search for and skim though "The Conquest of Bread" to see a hard Leftist complain about taxes. Be warned, the author is kind of a nutbar.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by dragonwriter on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:05PM (#14472064)
> Libertarian isn't necessarily right-wing, even though it generally is in the US.

American left-libertarians exist, but may not identify as libertarians because right-libertarians have kind of monopolized the label.

Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by rectang on Friday June 02, 2017 @03:24PM (#14472639)
I'd like to think that left-libertarians would focus on efficiency of the labor market and the attendant benefits to the broader economy. Right-libertarians have ceded that ground.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by ythn on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:00PM (#14472023)
Or maybe people have more nuanced views? People on HN generally support "liberal" things like caring for the environment and net neutrality, but a lot of people on HN are also small business owners and entrepreneurs and so also like the "business-friendly" economic policies of the right.
Re:Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their ... by dragonwriter on Friday June 02, 2017 @02:02PM (#14472039)
The "business-friendly" policies of the right are often not particularly friendly to small businesses, though such businesses are typically used as rhetorical devices in selling them.