No, it was Wal-Mart's OPENING that "Crippled" Pico Rivera, California

The business world was aflutter with the recent announcement by Wal-Mart that it was closing five stores around the country due to "plumbing problems," but more likely because of union activism among the employees of those stores. One article about the closures was even entitled, Wal-Mart's sudden closure has crippled a California city:

Wal-Mart's sudden closure of a store in Pico Rivera, California, has devastated the city.

The store was the city's second-biggest employer, and its closure resulted in the laying off of more than 500 workers, The Los Angeles Times reports.

The store also generated about 10% of Pico Rivera's sales tax revenue, or about $1.3 million annually, according to the report.

Now hundreds of laid-off employees are trying to find work while city officials scramble to plug the gap in revenue.

"It's a severe blow to our community, certainly, with the local economy, the homes and families, in terms of those people that were counting on those paychecks," Mayor Gregory Salcido of Pico Rivera told the Times.

With all due respect to the hardships being experienced by the Wal-Mart employees and by the citizens of Pico Rivera, it was not the closing of the Wal-Mart store that caused this crisis but the fact that the store was allowed to be opened in that community in the first place. I've never been to Pico Rivera, but if it at all resembles my hometown of Freeport, Illinois, I'm almost willing to bet that 30 years ago it probably had a diverse and vibrant number of small retail stores--perhaps even a functioning downtown business district. Again if it was all like Freeport, that vibrant downtown or wherever the small retailers were located was likely devastated once Wal-Mart came to town, undercut their prices and forced them out of business. By allowing the big bully corporate behemoth into their community, the city fathers (and mothers) were very much complicit in setting up a situation where the town could be devastated when that behemoth chose to petulantly punish its workers for the hideous trangression of asserting that they might actually deserve a slightly larger percentage of the profits the company makes from raping the planet and destroying economic livelihoods everywhere it goes.

If the citizens of Pico Rivera were at all smart, they would raise a big collective middle finger at Wal-Mart, tell the company not to let the door hit them on the ass on the way out and begin to reopen those small businesses that the retailer replaced in the first place. But if the last three decades have proven anything, it's that Americans LIKE it when corporate America pisses on their heads and tells them it's raining. So I have no doubt that when Wal-Mart gets over its snit fit, many idiot citizens of Pico Rivera will bow, scrape and grovel, welcoming their economic exploiter back with open arms.


Bonus: "Better to live on your feet than die on your knees"

Even Walmart Knows that Homophobia is Bad for Business

Almost everybody is familiar with the demographic marketing phrase: "the key 18 to 54 age group." As if every human being over or under that age range is somehow less valuable. Well, they are actually--at least to corporate America. The first half of that age group is supposedly when young adults form the brand loyalties and shopping habits that they will retain for a lifetime, while the latter half are in their prime earning (read: consumption) years. This is why marketing for most products other than dietary fiber supplements, incontinence garments and mobility scooters are slick, flashy and heavy on the "coolness" factor. Given a choice between possibly offending older consumers versus cementing brand loyalty of the 18 to 54'ers, most companies figure that while granny may indignantly chuck a slipper at the screen, she's unlikely to change her 50-year love of a particular breakfast cereal brand as a result.

All of this is a long winded way of explaining why Walmart shocked a lot of people when it came out strongly against the Arkansas religious "freedom" measure that was very similar to Indiana's. It was one thing for Apple to condemn the Indiana law--Apple presumably has lots of gay and lesbian customers and the bigoted old white fuckers who support these shitty discriminatory laws aren't likely to ever understand how a smartphone works, let alone ever buy one. But the stereotype is that Walmart customers are exactly the kind of Fox News watching, assault rifle totin,' Jesus lovin' morons who would applaud a law like this. After all, to cite another common but probably not completely inaccurate stereotype, your average gay couple's tastes in home furnishings do not likely run to the kind of clapboard crap on display at Sam Walton's megastore hellholes--nor would they ever want to be caught dead wearing the sweatshop assembled, ill-fitting polyester dress shirts hanging on the clothing racks.

Walmart probably could have stayed quiet regarding the proposed Arkansas law. After all, no one was ASKING the company for its opinion. The fact that it chose to say something represents an obvious awareness that younger Americans, even those less financially well off, on average tend to be more socially tolerant than older ones. Young adults today are far more likely to have friends who are openly gay than their older cohorts. Walmart just found a free way to get the best advertising it could have in the form of news stories that will make little Brandi and Justin feel better about shopping there so they will hopefully develop a lifelong habit. After all, what are Bessie and Elmer going to do, stuck as they are on a fixed income and living in a trailer with no savings account, suddenly boycott Wally World in favor of Nieman Marcus?

So let's all get our warm and fuzzys about this shining example of good corporate citizenship without getting all wrapped up in the truth of the matter, which is that if they didn't think it would help improve their bottom line the greedy fuckers who own and run Walmart wouldn't have said jack shit. And let's not ponder the day when predatory megacorporations like America's biggest retailer have finally destroyed the livelihood of average Americans to the point where even most gay and lesbian couples have no choice but to shop there whether they like it or not.


Bonus: "Indiana wants me--but I can't go back there"

America's Worst Restaurant Chain Utterly Clueless About How to Reverse Declining Sales

It could happen to a more deserving group of corporate assholes:

February was an ice-cold month for McDonald's, with same-store sales dropping 4% in its troubled U.S. stores and 1.7% globally.

Sounds like these are troubled times indeed under the tarnished golden arches. So what does the company plan to do to reverse this decline?

"Consumer needs and preferences have changed and McDonald's current performance reflects the urgent need to evolve with today's consumers, reset strategic priorities and restore business momentum," the company said.

"Customer needs and preferences have changed?" Oh, you mean that minimum wage earners--like your own employees--are feeling the strain of working for such shitty pay that they can no longer even afford to eat out at McDonalds as much any more? If so, "resetting your strategic priorities" to "restore business momentum" would mean that your company along with every other minimum wage paying retailer out there needs to RAISE FUCKING WORKER SALARIES. But I gather that's the LAST fucking thing you assholes would consider doing.

Oh, but there seem to be some other silly ideas floating around:

At an investors' conference last week, McDonald's also said it planned to launch a mobile app this summer that may also be part of a loyalty program...

I just wonder if any of the empty corporate suits who get paid big bucks to come up with these stupid ideas ever actually visit their company's shitty restaurants--especially those located outside of tourist areas. Go in, sit down for a while and see how many of the downtrodden people for whom a trip to Mickey D's represents a big night out are carrying around fancy smartphones.

In addition, there was this little nugget:

"It's interesting that McDonald's had a 'Turnaround Summit' last week in an effort to address its U.S. sales decline. The focus for the fast-food chain will be on enhancing the restaurant experience, which it hopes will help curb the decline," says Joshua Raymond, chief market strategist at City Index UK.

Yeah, that's the problem right there. It isn't because McDonald's customer base can no longer afford to stuff the faces with its garbage "food" four nights a week, instead they just need to spruce up the large indoor toilets they call restaurants, as if most of their "discerning" customers even notice how drab and depressing the fucking places are--despite the hideously bright fluorescent lighting.

The article ended, of course, in the most laughable fashion possible:

In its own statement, McDonald's spelled out its goal in no uncertain terms: "To be a true destination of choice around the world and reassert McDonald's as a modern, progressive burger company."

Somebody please tell me exactly what it means to be a "modern, progressive burger company," because I have no fucking clue. It's too bad the corporate stenographer posing as a "business reporter" working for USA Today couldn't have at least ASKED some publicity flack at the company just what that meaningless pile of corporate speak bullshit really means. That might have at least been entertaining.

The good news in all this is that it sounds like McDonalds' corporate "leadership" remains utterly clueless as to how they can reverse their serious sales decline. It's probably to much to hope that the nosedive will continue all the way into bankruptcy for America's largest purveyor of shitty food and ugly ass retail buildings. But a blogger can dream, can't I?


Bonus: In this case, the real clowns are not Ronald but the empty corporate suits

Two-Thirds Of America's Biggest Retailers Are Worried About Flat Wages

(editor's note: I currently have a small backlog of posts and aim to have one up every day this week--so be sure to check back frequently!)

You really have to laugh about this one, lest you not begin to cry. It seems the same asshole American retail companies who pay their employees shit wages are now quite concerned that their bottom lines are being negatively affected by employees being paid shit wages. Here's Huffington Post with the story:

Sixty-eight percent of the top 100 retail companies in the U.S. -- a group that includes, Walmart, Apple, McDonald's and J.C. Penney -- say the country's stagnant wages pose a major threat to their bottom lines, according to a new report by the Center For American Progress, a left-leaning think tank.

Researchers analyzed the most recent SEC 10-K filings of the largest 100 retailers in the country and found that more than two-thirds of these corporations issued warnings to investors that profits could be hampered by flat wages, high unemployment and low consumer spending. The trend is hammering companies that target high-income customers, like Whole Foods and Dillard's, and those that market to low-income shoppers, like Dollar General and T.J. Maxx, according to the report.

So, do you suppose this concern is enough to get these companies to actually raise their employees' salaries to a decent living wage? Of course not. Apparently, all the other companies BUT them are supposed to do it:

But even as two-thirds of the companies in the study pointed to stagnating wages as a source of their problems, many of them have opposed or stayed silent on any proposed wage increases. There are a few notable exceptions. Gap promised to institute a $10 per hour minimum wage by next year, and Costco's starting pay is already $11.50.

Oooh, those Gap and Costco employees are living large aren't they? Just for the record, $10 bucks an hour equals a full time annual wage of just $20,800--assuming they are allowed to work full time. How much disposable income do you suppose a head of a household is going to have on that kind of miserly salary? The article goes on, but you get the idea.

It's too bad so few Americans know anything about their own history. If they did they might recall that Henry Ford, when he was in the process building one of the world's largest automobile companies, recognized that there wouldn't be anyone able to afford to buy his product unless he paid his own employees a decent wage. Other companies followed suit, and it was these actions that were businesses' historical contribution to creation of the American middle class.

So what happened? Well, it seems that builders like Ford who knew their every little facet of how their companies operated were eventually replaced by greedy MBA assholes who'd never spent a day actually doing the work of those companies, and didn't give a shit about anything but the short term bottom line and their own pay, stock options and golden parachutes.

We've been told over and over and over again that "the consumer is the driver of the American economy." But when the consumer gets squeezed to the point that they no longer have any discretionary income, sooner or later the big corporations will have succeeded in killing the geese that lays their golden eggs. For nearly two generations now, American business has been operating under the mantra that "greed is good," and as a result now it isn't geese but chickens that are coming home to roost. And those are some sorry-ass, scrawny-looking chickens at that.


Bonus: "Got an 'L' on my forehead...and a stupid uniform."

What Happens When Big Corporations Become Immune to Bad Publicity?

Poor Tracy Morgan. Many working class people in America have already been figuratively run over by the predatory practices of big corporations like Walmart, that ever since the go-go 1980s have been driving down their wages and offshoring good paying jobs even while conning them with "low prices" they have had to pay for in so many ways they are unable to see. Morgan, however, had the misfortune of getting literally run over by a Walmart, specifically by an 18-wheeler piloted by a company driver who'd apparently been no-dosing it for about 24 hours.

Given that Morgan is a popular entertainer with a large fan base, you'd have thought that the smart thing for Walmart to do would be to quietly settle the civil suit filed by Morgan and the family of his companion who was killed in the crash. Well, you thought wrong, Natch:

Walmart's attorneys said yesterday in a court filing that it doesn't owe Morgan and his fellow passengers anything because they should have protected themselves by buckling up. The company further denied any responsibility for how long the truck driver, who Morgan's lawyers claim was sleep-deprived at the time of the accident, had been awake.

Understandably outraged, as any right-thinking person should be, Morgan responded:

"After I heard what Walmart said in court, I felt I had to speak out. I can't believe Walmart is blaming me for an accident that they caused. My friends and I were doing nothing wrong. I want to thank my fans for sticking with me during this difficult time."

Morgan didn't call for his fans to boycott Walmart, but it's probably just as well that he didn't. Citizens Consumers Idiots in this country have become so inured to corporate malfeasance that even having one of their favorite entertainers struck down like road kill likely wouldn't be enough to get them to change their shopping habits. Then you have the morons who, every time someone calls for a boycott in a situation like this, immediately rally to the company's side and call for an anti-boycott.

There was a time not all that long ago when America had a fairly aggressive Fourth Estate which investigated corporate malfeasance, and when caught the companies in question instantly scrambled to do everything they could to at least give the appearance that they were setting things right. In recent years, of course, the so-called "free press" has been taken over by a few giant conglomerates, so it takes some really spectacular fuckups like poisoning half the Gulf of Mexico or having a speed-addicted truck driver crush a teevee star under his wheels to get the media to pay any attention at all.

And yet...British Petroleum continues to do business in the United States as if nothing ever happened off the coast of Louisiana, and Walmart continues to rake in massive profits despite suffering one public relations black eye after another. Truly, we have reached the point where there is no longer any real incentive for big corporations--who have had their so-called "personhood" etched in stone by the Supreme Court--to act as "good citizens."

The Ayn Rand-following, knucklehead libertarians have expended so much energy convincing their fellow citizens consumers idiots that big government is a threat to them. It isn't until they end up like Tracy Morgan, roadkill splattered all over the pavement, that they begin to realize that big business is every bit as responsible for creating our onrushing 21st century dystopia as any NSA spook.

And by then it's too damn late.


Bonus: A very special tune dedicated to Walmart

Happy Birthday, Walmart!

Hey, guess what? America's most predatory retailer, purveyor of mountains of cheap shit from China, scourge of the small businesses everywhere, creator of more ugly ass suburban blight than any other, turned 50 years old this week. So to help celebrate this monumental milestone on America's road to perdition, here is Gawker with a blistering rant from a very happy FORMER Walmart employee:

Well, I'm finally done... I am so glad I will never have to work that god forsaken third shift nightmare of a job at Wal Mart again. I just couldn't take it anymore...I just couldn't waste one more second of my life in that soulless corporate hellhole. There's only one way to go from now on and that's up. I've already been at the bottom of the shit pile...horrible hours, pathetic wages, idiotic ignorant knuckle dragging customers, and asshole incompetent managers. Gonna miss that 10 percent discount though haha

And every time I remember some new injustice perpetrated by this greedy unholy corporate behemoth Im gonna post it on Facebook until I purge its poison out of my soul..one year, eight months, two days and thirty two seconds of my life I can't get back working as a corporate whore for the devil LOL

Who in God's name expects people to work EVERY weekend and EVERY holiday because the managers are too damn lazy and uncaring to rotate the schedule..."Well we'll just make everybody on third shift work every weekend to eliminate the hassle of changing the schedule every week" Sad but true...stupid assholes

And you MUST work 12 hours on Black Friday..Which in the greedy corporate soulless world of Wal Mart starts THURSDAY Thanksgiving DAY at 7 p.m. Screw your families and holiday dinner, people..there's MONEY to make.

Oh but Wal mart employees have off Christmas Day"...oh excuse me I didn't know Christmas Day ended at 10 p.m.

How do they plan where they put there stores? It probably goes something like this:
Let's take a crew of desperate people looking for work in a shitty economy in a depressed area, build a big boxy ugly store and sell cheap merchandise manufactured in China and from other poor nations with a child labor force and sell the crap for cheaper than other stores because we dont' pay our employees a livable wage or adequate benefits and they're pretty much disposable if they complain.

And we don't have time to train them properly and we don't have enough people to stock the crap we sell... so simple things like ROTATING STOCK and disposing of damaged or tainted merchandise so people don't get sick goes by the wayside. If our customers get expired produce and meat and dairy products or broken merchandise and stuff that has had chemicals leaked on them...well BUYER BEWARE!!

And if any of our employees gets injured we bully them into not filing a claim and if they do we fire them.

And if they reports unsafe work practices to OSHA we lie our asses off when the investigators show up and pretend that we're "painting the bulletin boards" so we don't have to post the OSHA report for all employees to see as we are required to do so.

What our customers don't know would curdle their blood...pesticides stored on top of pet food, expired baby formula..mice feces in the bakery along with chewed bags of bread...mice with a carnivorous fondness for beef jerky, leaving their poop behind in the display box after chewing through the bags, and meanwhile customers are buying beef jerky from the SAME BOX!!

And by the way if you are buying HOLIDAY candy hate to tell you that's been sitting in our dirty warehouse/backroom since summer for MANY months! ENJOY!!! The mice sure did... Just dust off the feces, get rid of the chewed bags and sell them suckers!!!

If you're ever in our store when the late night bi-weekly cleaning of the meat department cases takes place you'll learn first hand what a rotting corpse probably smells like..it should be done more often but no one wants to do it and the managers don't really give a shit to enforce it...this filthy cesspole catch basin of liquid blood scum is lurking about six inches below that package of hamburger meat you're about to buy, Mr and Mrs. Customer. Bon Appetit!!

Incompetence and indifference trickles down from the top management and infects the average worker..for example the person who orders paper towels was on vacation one week so no one thought to order paper towels for the bathrooms...you know, the same bathrooms the employees, the people who handle the FOOD, use too.

So employees wash their hands and have to dry them on their dirty work clothes!!!!!! This went on at our store for a week until some upper management asshole FINALLY gave permission for some lower manger to pull paper towels off the shelves and stock the bathrooms. The issue at stake: Wal Mart would be LOSING money by doing that so they balked at it until workers complained.

Wal Mart is all about the almighty dollar, screw the customers and double screw the employees.

I like for example how employees are instructed FIRST to punch in a code if they are being are robbed which sends a call to the police. In fact, uou have to do it in order for the cash drawer to open...gee THAT won't make the guy with a gun in my face at all suspicious or jumpy when he seems me punching a bunch of buttons.

I don't know what your local store is like but where I worked, it was a mix of middle aged people (quite a few women) who have lost their jobs in the recession and took the job when this place opened because there are no real good jobs to be found in [my area], where the poverty rate is high; there were also young people many of them in college or right out of college who couldn't find work elsewhere.

Yeah we had our share of a "lowlife flunkies" but most of them are the customers who make our lives even more hellish. The people I worked with were mostly poor to middle class people who work hard for very little pay and a lot of abuse.

When a coworker left Wal Mart, it felt to me like it must feel when you're prison, when a longtime fellow inmate is released. You feel happy for them but you wish it was you.

And now, a little reminder of WHY America is going down the tubes, here is a reader comment from some asshole who call himself/herself DoctorOfStyle DEFENDING Walmart:

Boo fucking hoo. At least it is a job. I guess we should just raise taxes on the "rich" a little more so you can sit on your can. Maybe import a few more Mexicans to do the work you are too good to do.

And Jaysus wept.


Bonus: Walmart needs a "scared straight" program

Hewlett-Packard Likely To Lay Off 25-30,000 Employees

The big announcement from Hewlett-Packard is not expected to come until tomorrow, but for the company's workers it is expected to be a bad one. Here is Market Watch with the details:

H-P will post fiscal second-quarter results following media reports that the company was going to eliminate 25,000 to 30,000 jobs, or up to 10% of its workforce. The Palo Alto, Calif.-based company will present both its results and restructuring plan after the closing bell, the source told MarketWatch.

For the quarter, analysts expect H-P to post a profit of 91 cents a share, on revenue of $29.9 billion, according to a consensus survey by FactSet Research. For the year-earlier period, the company reported a profit of $1.24 a share, on revenue of $31.6 billion.

The company has struggled with stiffer competition and internal squabbles, which have taken a toll on its market value. The company’s stock slid by 25% since its last earnings report in late February, when it reported that profits had plunged by 44% and gave a disappointing forecast for the current period. See full story on H-P's last quarterly report.

Many analysts see layoffs at the tech giant as inevitable. “These are never fun but given where H-P is, these are necessarily to get the company back on track,” Sterne Agee analyst Shaw Wu said.

Topeka Capital Markets analyst Brian White affirmed this view, saying in a note, “Downsizing at H-P is clearly needed.”

The reported plan, he said, could “benefit H-P’s annual earnings per share by about 75 cents.” He also noted that H-P’s efficiency as measured by revenue per employee was at “the lowest level in a decade.”

Personally, I'd rather see the downsizing of asshole analysts like Shaw Wu and Brian White. After all, unlike those two useless paper pushing parasites, Hewlett--Packard employees actually make something for a living.

I would also note that H-P's CEO is still the hideous Meg Whitman, who thought nothing of blowing a cool $144 million or so of her own cash in her hilariously inept California Gubernatorial bid against Jerry Brown. If H-P needs to cut costs, maybe it should fire her fucking ass first.


Bonus: "It's so easy to hurt others when you can't feel pain"

Fortis Plastics Shutting Down Another Plant (Illinois)

image: Downtown Carlyle, Illinois is about to become a little bit deader, thanks to a factory closing.

Back on January 8th, I posted a story about a Fortis Plastics plant closing in Ohio. Well, now it is Illinois' turn, as reported by my all time favorite business publication, Plastics News:

Fortis Plastics LLC is preparing to close its last plant, a custom injection molding facility in Carlyle.

The company sent workers a letter dated April 9 warning that the plant will permanently close within 60 days. Employees were told their last day would fall in the period between June 9 and June 22.

State officials and the mayor of Carlyle have been notified of the imminent closing, and officials will be available to help assist workers who are losing their jobs, the letter said.

The shutdown apparently marks the final chapter for Fortis, which has been closing plants since at the end of 2011. Much of the equipment at the other plants was auctioned off in January and February.

A Fortis worker, who requested anonymity, said employees in Carlyle have been aware of the other plant closings, and had expected their plant to eventually shut down, too.

“I pretty much knew this was coming. It wasn’t a shock to me,” the worker said.

Other workers said the Carlyle plant had seen most of its molding work disappear in recent weeks, and that resin and other materials had occasionally been in short supply.

The Carlyle plant did medical-related work, among other projects.

Fortis Plastics was formed in 2008 when New York private investment group Monomoy Capital Partners LP, acquired and combined the custom molding divisions of Leggett & Platt Inc. and Atlantis Plastics Inc.

In recent months the company has shut down or announced plans to shut down plants in Jackson, Tenn.; Fort Smith, Ark., South Bend, Ind.; Poplar Bluff, Mo.; Wilmington, Ohio; and Ramos Arizpe, Mexico.

I guess that advice that Dustin Hoffman received at the beginning of The Graduate is no longer valid.


Bonus: "Q: Why are we here? A: Plastics, asshole"

Green Mountain Coffee Executives "Baffled" By Declining Sales

The big news in the stock market this week was the plunging sales of Green Mountain Coffee, which caused the company's stock to sink dramatically. Here is CNN with the story:

Green Mountain Coffee Roasters shares plummeted Thursday after the company reported quarterly revenue that missed estimates and lowered its guidance for 2012.

Green Mountain (GMCR) shares sank nearly 40% in early morning trading Thursday, dipping to about $30 after closing Wednesday at $49.52.

The company's quarterly earnings came in line with expectations at 64 cents a share, though its $885 million in sales missed estimates of $972 million.

Green Mountain also reduced its fiscal 2012 sales guidance from between $4.3 and $4.5 billion to between $3.8 and $4 billion. The full-year earnings-per-share projection was cut from between $2.55 and $2.65 to between $2.40 and $2.50.

As usual in these situations, the suits don't have a clue:

In a conference call with analysts, Green Mountain executives said they didn't have a full explanation for why sales were weaker than expected. They suggested that low brewer machine sales and weak demand for holiday drinks during the warm winter -- like cider and hot cocoa -- were partially to blame.

"We're very positive about this business going forward, but there's a lot of moving parts," Green Mountain CEO Larry Blanford said.

Green Mountain currently dominates the single-serving coffee market with its popular Keurig, or K-Cup, machines.

It was one of the fastest-growing companies of the past decade and one of the best-performing stocks, handing investors 110% gains on an annualized basis until last fall.

Please allow me as a former Green Mountain customer to offer up a possible explanation. I used to love Green Mountain coffee after having discovered it more than a decade ago when it was still a small regional concern. I even went out of my way to order it online back when it was not available in the stores in my area.

Nowadays, I can even buy it in my local supermarket. But I don't. In fact, I ordered up my last ever batch of the stuff about a year ago. And you know why? Because the coffee now tastes like ass. I don't know what the difference is between how they make the stuff now and how they made it a decade ago. All I know is what my tastes buds tell me.

Somewhere along the way, Green Mountain became far more concerned with expansion than it did about putting out a good product. But that is par for the course in corporate America these days.


Bonus: Instead of some Green Mountain, how about some Green Day...because I came around on Green Mountain

Five U.S. Businesses That Ought To Be Ashamed Of Themselves

I can't really quibble with this article from AOL Daily Finance, especially since I've taken shots at several of these companies myself:

When a big company gains enough momentum that its direction becomes self-sustaining, its influence can ripple through society with a bevy of positive consequences -- like the creation of jobs, the spread of ideas, and a general improvement in living standards.

But capitalism -- like any other -ism -- is far from a perfect system. Along with a host of American companies that we should view with pride, there are a number that have created situations we think are downright evil. For exploitative behaviors that harm customers, employees, shareholders and the general public, these companies (and one whole industry) have earned their seats on the corporate netherworld's board of shame.

Details are at the link, but here are the shameful five:

5. Walmart

4. Goldman Sachs

3. Cigarette Industry

2. Chesapeake Energy

1. Monsanto

My only quibble is that I would place Nos. 4 and 5 at 1 and 2.


Bonus: A commodity that is in all too short supply these days

"The Downfall Of IBM"

Information Technology writer Robert X. Cringely published an article this past Friday that will be the first in a series about the current state of affairs at IBM that touches on so many themes I discuss here regularly at TDS that I wanted to highlight them. So, without further ado, here is Cringley from betanews:

The direct impetus for this column is IBM’s internal plan to grow earnings-per-share (EPS) to $20 by 2015. The primary method for accomplishing this feat, according to the plan, will be by reducing US employee head count by 78 percent in that time frame.

Reducing employees by more than three quarters in three years is a bold and difficult task. What will it leave behind? Who, under this plan, will still be a US IBM employee in 2015? Top management will remain, the sales organization will endure, as will employees working on US government contracts that require workers to be US citizens. Everyone else will be gone. Everyone.

Now industries and businesses change all the time because they have to or want to. Big companies and small have to adjust to the realities and changing reward structures of their markets and cultures. Or they change to better adapt to new opportunities. But what’s happening at IBM is different than that. It’s different because this incredible American success story, if it continues to follow its current course, will utterly fail. It’s different, too, because neither IBM management nor Wall Street seem to have the slightest notion of the peril facing the company. My deepest fear is they simply don’t care.

Gee...greater profitability through firing employees by a group of shortsighted, greedy senior managers who care only about the value of their stock portfolios. Where have I seen this before? Only in countless other stories I've posted here at TDS over the past year.

But please continue:

IBM seems to believe it is cheaper to replace a skilled worker with two or three unskilled workers to do the same job. That is like hiring nine women to make a baby in one month. While it looks good on paper it is not practical and is not working. The language barrier for IBM’s Indian staff is huge, for example. Troubleshooting, which was once performed on conference calls, is now done with instant messaging because the teams speak so poorly. Problems that an experienced person could fix in a few minutes are taking an army of folks an hour to fix. This is infuriating and alarming to IBM’s customers.

IBM’s five year plan ending in 2010 was supposed to double EPS from just under $5 to about $11. (Today it is closer to $13.) During the last five years there was an accelerated push of jobs offshore for cost reasons, high attrition rates, and longer product release cycles. The next five year plan for 2015 is to again double EPS to about $20. Can this be done? Probably, but the particular way they are going about it is also likely to destroy IBM.

IBM’s biggest money maker is its Global Services business, which also employs the most people. Ten years ago Global Services was an even larger part of IBM but the company is now making a lot less on its contracts, and the turnover of business is brisk. It is in Global Services where you see the most jobs being shipped offshore. But the problem is the offshore teams often lack the skill and experience to do the work, problems mount, customers like (most recently) The Walt Disney Company get upset and leave.

I’ll be providing more details in subsequent posts, but I want to end here with a point about how patently unfair and simply stupid this is. When I wrote about IBM five years ago the cost reduction program was called LEAN and it was supposed to mold from Big Blue a hyper-efficient business machine. Yet today IBM has more layers of management than it had in 2007. These extra layers come at a cost both in dollars and in accountability. Those extra layers insulate IBM’s top management from responsibility for their decisions. At the highest levels in Armonk they think things are going beautifully because they are out of touch with the reality of their own company.

Today at IBM the US workers who try to save the business are the first in line to lose their jobs. Management accountability is gone. The people who mess up get to keep their jobs; and those trying to retain the business lose their jobs.

Make no mistake, what is going on at IBM as reported in this piece is horrible, but it is hardly unique. Corporate America has become a wasteland in which the jackals and hyenas are ripping many companies apart seeking the maximum short term profit. These business school psychopaths care nothing about the companies, their employees or the health of the American economy in general. As long as they get theirs and can get out before the collapse, all is well in their world.


Bonus: This clip has been the subject of so many Internet parodies, it is time to reclaim the original for just how powerful it is

H&R Block To Close 200 Offices, Lay Off 350

Office closings and mass layoffs hit yet another industry that is being hit hard by technical innovation. Here is Bloomberg with the details:

H&R Block Inc., the biggest U.S. tax preparer, plans to cut 350 jobs and close about 200 company- owned offices as part of a realignment.

Also, H&R Block said it is searching for a new chief financial officer and that CFO Jeff Brown will remain with the company during the search process. Once a successor is found, Brown will transition to chief accounting and risk officer, the Kansas City, Missouri-based company said in a statement.

I've always prepared my own taxes, and about five years ago switched over to Turbo Tax. That program is so easy to use, it amazes me that so many people still pay someone to do their taxes for them. Sadly, H&R Block can hire a new CFO if it wants, but that won't change the fact that, like Blockbuster Video, their business model is yesterday's news.


Bonus: "I'm the taxman"

International Paper Closing Four Plants, Eliminating 215 Jobs

A corporate merger was the reason for this mass layoff story. The Memphis Business Journal has the details:

Citing the need to eliminate overcapacity and integrate its now-combined container business, International Paper Co. is shutting down four plants across the country in the next two months.

The plants are located in Fort Smith, Ark., Santa Paula, Calif., Chicago and Solon, Ohio. The company will eliminate a total of 215 jobs, according to an International Paper statement. The plants are a combination of facilities owned by Austin, Texas-based Temple-Inland Inc. and International Paper.

The closings come months after Memphis-based International Paper (NYSE: IP) completed its $4.4 billion acquisition of Temple-Inland, which brought an additional 10,000 employees, 59 box plants, 14 building products plants and seven containerboard mills into IP’s group of 23,000 employees, 12 paper mills and more than 140 box plants on six continents.

Sounds to me like someone is trying to monopolize the paper industry.


Bonus: We don't need corporate America to do any more joining together

Another U.S. Government Sellout: Fracking For Export

It's bad enough that rampant natural gas fracking is being allowed in the U.S. despite the negative environmental impacts of the process as well as the risk of earthquakes. Because natural gas is difficult to export, however, one could at least argue that fracking is helping to reduce America's dependence on foreign energy sources. But now all of that is about to change thanks to the fact that the U.S. government has become a wholly owned subsidiary of the corporations. Here is CNN Money with the details:

The government approved the first ever natural gas export facility in the lower 48 states on Monday, clearing the way for a project that could be a significant job creator.

But critics argue that, just like the Keystone pipeline expansion, building this project will have environmental impacts far beyond the plant itself. They also say it could raise the price of natural gas in the U.S.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission voted in favor of Texas-based Cheniere Energy's plan to build a giant natural gas liquefaction and export terminal at Sabine Pass, which straddles the Texas-Louisiana boarder just north of the Gulf of Mexico.

Well, so much for the argument that fracking is helping to make America more energy secure. Surprise, surprise, that argument is and always was complete bullshit. Instead, it's all about the Benjamins:

Cheniere says the plant itself and the natural gas extraction needed to fuel it will support between 30,000 and 50,000 jobs a year.

The United Sates is currently experiencing a boom in natural gas production, largely thanks to the controversial process of hydrologic fracturing, or fracking for short.

All the big oil companies, including BP, Exxon Mobil, and Royal Dutch Shell, are now participating in the boom.

But the surge in production -- without any way to export it -- has caused a collapse in natural gas prices in the U.S. The gas industry sees exports as crucial to keep the boom going, along with the thousands of jobs the boom has created.

Natural gas can command five times the U.S. price in Asia or Europe. It can be used as a home heating fuel, burned to make electricity, or used in chemical or fertilizer production.

Notice how they lamely try to justify this action by claiming it will create jobs. Not withstanding the fact that, just like with the Keystone Pipeline, the job creation estimates are no doubt greatly overinflated, there is this little problem:

Cheniere's application was the first the government approved. Applications for seven other facilities around the country are pending. If all are approved, the nation could end up exporting one-fifth of its current gas output.

That's something critics are working to stop.

Fracking is a big reason why. Opponents say an increase in gas exports will lead to an increase in fracking.

Fracking involves injecting sand, water and chemicals deep into the ground to crack the rock and allow the gas to flow more freely. Some fear it is contaminating the ground water and leading to earthquakes.

Critics also say it could lead to an increase in natural gas prices in the U.S.
That could harm not only consumers who may pay more for heat, but also manufacturers that could pay more for electricity and materials.

That "could potentially have catastrophic impacts on U.S. manufacturing," said a report on the matter from House Democrats on the Natural Resources Committee.

Which would no doubt destroy far more jobs than will be created in the fracking industry. So all of the risks that the American public is being asked to run by allowing fracking to continue are not even being borne to benefit them, and what's more, their own elected government is the one selling them down the river. Too bad so many of them are hooked on American Idol, Dancing with the Stars and the NFL and will never notice until the day a fracking-generated earthquake drops the roof right down on their fucking thick skulls.


Bonus: Now you know what it is like to live in an exploited colony

Corporate Welfare Porn: States Allow Big Companies To Keep Employees' Income Tax Withholdings

The next time you hear a wingnut conservative complaining about "welfare queens" sucking down the hard earned money of the taxpayers or griping and moaning about "socialism," here is a story from Reuters you can send to him or her as a counterpoint:

Deals cut with the states over the past two decades diverted $5.5 billion from public purposes to private gain, the report says. Close to $700 million more was diverted last year, Good Jobs First estimates.

New Jersey approved $73.2 million in new deals in 2011 on top of $178 million diverted that year alone under previous deals. I calculate that at nearly $80 per household in corporate welfare based on New Jersey’s 3.1 million households.

These deals typify corporate socialism, in which business gains are privatized and costs socialized. They also mean government picks winners and losers, interfering with competitive markets. Leaders in both parties embrace these giveaways because they draw campaign donations from corporate interests and votes from people who do not understand that they are subsidizing huge companies.

Michael Press, a Connecticut consultant on tax incentives, says such deals, however troubling, are an inevitable result of the U.S. Constitution setting up competition between the states.

“In an ideal world we would not provide any corporate subsidies,” Press told me. “It looks like corruption. But if you do it right, if you only target those companies whose behavior you change to create jobs or keep jobs in your state then these targeted temporary arrangements are cheaper – much cheaper – and can be more effective than an overall reduction in tax rates.”

The mission of Good Jobs First is making economic development subsidies accountable and effective. In years of working with their data I have always found it sound. While Greg LeRoy, Good Jobs First’s founder, has rooted out all sorts of hidden subsidies over the years, he emphasizes that he is not inherently hostile to them, only to secrecy, waste and what he calls job piracy and job blackmail.

“Job piracy” occurs when one state diverts taxes to lure an employer across state lines. AMC Entertainmentannounced a deal last year to move its corporate headquarters from Kansas City, Mo., to a nearby Kansas suburb. In return, Good Jobs First said, Kansas will let the multiplex chain keep $47 million of state income taxes withheld from its workers’ paychecks, a drain on public finances that did not create any jobs, but does enrich the Wall Street firms that own AMC including arms of J. P. Morgan, Apollo Management, Bain Capital and the Carlyle Group. AMC declined to answer my questions.

“Job blackmail” occurs when a company threatens to close a plant unless it gets tax money.

In Illinois, the law requires companies to threaten to leave before they can keep taxes withheld from paychecks. Motorola Mobility, now being acquired by Google; the truck maker Navistar; the German manufacturer Continental Tire, and three auto makers – Chrysler, Ford and Mitsubishi – get to keep $346.8 in taxes over 10 years because they threatened to leave Illinois. Navistar can pocket $62.1 million even if it fires a quarter of its Illinois workforce, its contract shows. A recent deal gives Sears $150 million, Good Jobs First reported.

Make no mistake, government has the means to put a stop to this nonsense. All that needs to happen is the 50 states all agree that none of them will grant this type of blackmail to the corporations. And the federal government could pledge to enact a prohibitive tariff on any company that sends its jobs offshore. It is also a fact that, however battered it may be, the American consumer market is still the largest in the world, and no corporation wants to lose access to that market. Government has all the leverage, it just chooses not to use it.

It will, of course, never happen because as the article points out the small army of corporate lobbyists with their large campaign checks in the state houses and in Washington collectively have more influence that the entire voting public. So expect more and more corporate welfare giveaways until the day finally comes when the whole corrupt, rotten edifice crumbles under it own weight.

Whistleblower Accuses IT Giant Of Immigration Fraud

It's bad enough that American jobs are being shipped overseas because of globalization. It's even worse when cheap foreign labor is being imported into the United States with the complicity of the federal government. Here is CBS News with the details:

We've all had this happen: you call an American company's 800 number for help, and end up talking to someone in a foreign country. It's called outsourcing. American firms do it because foreign labor can be cheaper.

But now, one company is being accused of bringing those lower-paid workers to the U.S. illegally and that may be costing Americans jobs.

The allegations are the subject of a federal probe and CBS News has been investigating this story for months. The allegations have been made against a giant Indian information technology firm called Infosys. The charges are coming from inside the company, from an employee who has never spoken publicly before.

Jay Palmer is a principal consultant at the company called Infosys. He is also the whistleblower whose charges sparked the federal investigation. Palmer says Infosys, the global high-tech giant, engaged in a systematic practice of visa fraud, a charge the company denies.

Palmer said the first thing to catch his attention was an employee that had been in the U.S. from India several times before.

"He came up to me and he was literally in tears," Palmer said. "He told me he was over here illegally and he didn't wanna be here. He was worried that he would get caught."

Palmer says he began digging into how and why Infosys seemed to be bringing in large numbers of workers from its corporate headquarters in Bangalore, India, into the U.S.

Palmer says at first, most came over on H-1B visas. These visas are for people with specialized talents or a level of technical ability that can't be found among American workers.

When asked if all the people had some special expertise that couldn't be found in the U.S., Palmer said, "Absolutely not. Not even close. Many of them is what we call freshers. People that would just come over, whoever they could get to come over. Whoever got accepted for a visa."

Many of the people brought in, in fact, didn't know what they were doing at all, Palmer said. "There was not a project or program that I was involved in that we did not remove somebody because they had no knowledge of what they were doing," he said.

So then what's the motive to bring them in? You could hire an American who is trained in that particular discipline and do better.

Palmer said, "It's purely profit."

Palmer says the Indian workers on his team were paid substantially less than an American would have made in the same job.

When the U.S. State Department began to limit the number of H-1B visas, Palmer says Infosys began using another type of visa, the B-1. The B-1 is meant for employees who are traveling to consult with associates, attend training or a convention. But Palmer says the employees were brought in not for meetings, but for full time jobs.

Palmer said the jobs were in "Everything from coding software to testing software to fixing software to installing."

So why would Infosys do this? And what advantage did it give them in the marketplace?

Palmer said, "They could outbid everybody or underbid everybody on every contract (because they were paying less.) For example...if I'm gonna pay you $15,000 a year why would I pay an American or a legal worker $65,000 a year? It makes no - it's just economics."

And Palmer says the B-1 workers never paid U.S. taxes because they received their salaries from India.

"They're basically a lot of times being paid on a cash card or a debit card where money was put in their account," Palmer said. "And the fact is, is they're just taking that money out and they're never paying U.S. taxes."

Infosys may not be a household name to many Americans, but in the technology business, the company is a powerhouse. It is one of the biggest consulting firms in the world with more than $6 billion in revenues last year alone, and 145,000 employees in 32 countries. But the bulk of its business comes from the U.S., re-engineering the computer systems of some of the biggest names in corporate America.

Federal officials say Infosys employees have 6,000 B-1 visas good for 10 years. Palmer says if just half of those employees were working on U.S. soil that would earn the company more than $150 million a year more than if they paid Americans the prevailing wage.

Infosys declined CBS News' repeated requests for an on-camera interview with a company executive or with chief executive officer and chairman S.D. Shibulal. But the company's chief financial officer, V. Balakrishnan, has denied the charges on Indian television, saying, "I think we are very clear that we have not violated any of the rules. We believe we have a strong case."

Infosys did give CBS News a statement saying, in part, "Any allegation or assertion that there is or was a corporate practice of evading the law in conjunction with the B-1 visa program is simply not accurate, and we will vigorously defend the company against any false allegation to that effect."

But one of Palmer's most serious allegations is that top company executives not only knew of the alleged fraud, but wanted to expand on it to increase profits. Palmer says during a 2010 meeting at Infosys' corporate headquarters in Bangalore the practice was discussed with a group of executives, including a senior vice president.

Palmer told CBS News, "There was some conversations about how to increase the share price, which is - in America is the stock price. So it's really about getting people over no matter what the cost or whatever. And you know, I think that's the first time I heard the term, you know, 'Americans are stupid.'"

If Palmer is telling the truth here, and I am inclined to believe that he is because as a whistleblower against a multi-national corporation he is the one who has placed his ass on the line, that assessment is absolutely correct, Americans ARE stupid. Forget for a moment whether or not Infosys is committing visa fraud. If they are, the company should obviously be vigorously prosecuted. What's even more outrageous is that at a time of record high unemployment, the U.S. government agreed to grant 6,000 visas for Infosys employees to come to work in the U.S. in the first place.

Does anyone still need to be shown a more glaring example of how the federal government now represents the interests of multinational corporations over those of the American people? There is NO justification for the U.S. to be importing cheap foreign labor, even if it was being done legally, when so many people are struggling to find work. It is all being done in the name of globalization, which was always a scam to enrich the elites at the expense of everybody else. We can only hope that these outrageous charges will be thoroughly investigated and the vigorously prosecuted if found to be accurate. But I'm not holding my breath on that last point.


Bonus: But don't worry, President Hopey-Changey feels your pain...he really does

United Space Alliance (Florida) Lays Off 10% Of Work Force

It is probably not a very good time to be the nation's "leading space shuttle contractor." Here is Florida Today with the story:

United Space Alliance, NASA’s lead space shuttle contractor, today shaves its work force by 10 percent with its latest round of layoffs, which include 181 employees based at Kennedy Space Center.

In all, 269 employees are leaving company offices in Florida, Texas and Alabama, the majority of them (186) through voluntary layoffs officially called self-nominations.

More than half the departing employees were the last to receive a “critical skills” bonus that was offered as an incentive to help retain those skills through flyout of the shuttle program, which completed its last mission last July. All laid off employees receive a severance package.

After today’s cuts, Houston-based USA expects to have 2,589 employees, including 1,323 at KSC.

Another round of reductions is planned in the fall.

Given that the space shuttle will never fly again, it is kind of baffling that this company is even still in business.


Bonus: Major Tom isn't coming home because he never got off the ground

Penn State Economists: Walmart Breeds Hate Groups

Regular readers will know that my sheer loathing for the predatory Walmart corporation knows few bounds. That said, even I had to laugh at the truly daffy conclusions reached by a report that appeared this week in Social Science Quarterly. Raw Story has the details:

The more Wal-Mart stores a county has, the more likely it is to have active hate groups in the area, according to Penn State economists.

“Wal-Mart has clearly done good things in these communities, especially in terms of lowering prices,” Stephan Goetz, professor of agricultural economics and regional economics, explained. “But there may be indirect costs that are not as obvious as other effects.”

The study, published in Social Science Quarterly, found that the number of Wal-Mart stores was a better predictor of hate group participation than the unemployment rate, high crime rates and low education.

There were 1,018 active hate groups in the United States in 2011, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, up from 1,002 in 2010.

The researchers believe that the correlation between Wal-Mart and hate groups exists because of breakdown of the community. Small local businesses are more likely to be members of civic groups and involved in the community. They are also more likely to have closer relationships among their employees.

“While we like to think of American society as being largely classless, merchants and bankers are part of what we could call a leadership class in a community,” Goetz said.

In contrast, people are more likely to feel alienated by big-box retailers like Wal-Mart, the researchers explained.

Hoo-boy, where to start on this one. Stretch Armstrong would have a hard time wrapping his arms around these findings. While the argument can certainly be made that big box stores have caused breakdowns in communities and lead to alienation among shoppers, asserting that they cause people to be more likely to join hate groups is a leap wider than the one Evel Knieval tried to make over the Snake River Canyon. Confusing association with causation is a basic logical fallacy, of course, and one you would think a couple of Penn State economists would scrupulously try to avoid.

There are a number of plausible reasons, in fact, why there might tend to be more hate groups in areas where there are more Walmarts that have nothing whatsoever to do with the company itself. One that I can think of right off the top of my head is that Walmarts predominate in smaller towns and cities that are usually less multicultural than the larger cities, and thus people who live there have far less exposure to those of other races, religions or national origin. People who live in such regions also tend to have less formal education on average because, as in my own case in having to leave my hometown for good after I graduated from college, there are far fewer white collar career opportunities available. Additionally, people living in such areas usually earn far less money and are less financially secure, which can cause them to look for scapegoats to blame for the dissatisfaction they feel in their own lives (though I would note that Walmart IS a factor in driving wages down, which directly contradicts the assertion made by Stephan Goetz above that Walmart's lower prices are a GOOD thing for these communities).

I think even the authors of this study realize that they are on shaky ground, because they qualified their conclusions with this statement:

“We’re not trying to pick on Wal-Mart,” said Goetz. “In this study, Wal-Mart is really serving as a proxy for any type of large retailer.”

“We doubt strongly that Wal-Mart intends to create such effects or that it specifically seeks to locate in places where hate groups form,” the researchers said.

What a relief it is that they only "doubt strongly" that Walmart is INTENTIONALLY responsible for their conclusions. Glad to know the billionaire members of the Walton clan don't secretly have Ku Klux Klan robes or SS Stormtrooper outfits tucked away in the back of their bedroom closets. Well, maybe. After all, the researchers didn't actually say they were willing to rule it out 100%.


Bonus: "I know politics bore you, but I feel like a hypocrite talking to you...and your racist friend"

Peak Cable Television?

Bad enough that idiot box has become little more that a corporate propaganda machine aimed at idiots...but the idiots now have to pay more than ever before for the privilege of being brainwashed. Here is MSNBC with the details:

If you're one of those people who complain that there’s nothing to watch on TV today even though you have a gazillion channels, you’re not going to be happy with this news – turns out, you’re paying more for cable.

The monthly rate for pay TV has been rising at an average of 6 percent annually and hit $86 a month last year for basic pay and premium-channel TV, according to a reported released Tuesday by market research firm The NPD Group. The uptick in licensing fees - which are the fees cable and satellite providers pay for programs - is driving much of the increase, at a time when consumer household income has hardly budged.

At this rate, NDP estimates consumers will be paying an average of $123 a month in 2015 and $200 a month by 2020.

The study was based on a quarterly electronic survey of 1,000 U.S. households.

Not surprisingly, the rising costs are making many consumers pull the plug on premium television. Today, there are five million fewer U.S. households viewing pay-TV services due to the mortgage crisis, the NDP research found, adding that those who did cancel service were prompted to do so because of economic reasons. But overall, the number of pay-TV subscribers has not declined substantially because of “bulk-service pay-TV contracts with apartment complexes and homeowners’ associations that have allowed pay-TV operators to retain subscriptions in vacant homes,” the study said.

Among the pay-TV cord cutters, most are still viewing their favorite shows via free Internet TV, traditional free broadcasting, and video-on-demand services such as Netflix, NDP reported.
The growth of lower-cost options, as well as cash-strapped consumers, is the reason the total number of subscribers of paid TV dropped to 100.9 million in the second quarter of last year, compared to 101.4 million in the first quarter, according to a IHS Screen Digest report released in September.

“As pay-TV costs rise and consumers’ spending power stays flat, the traditional affiliate-fee business model for pay-TV companies appears to be unsustainable in the long term,” said Keith Nissen, research director for NDP. “Much needed structural changes to the pay-TV industry will not happen quickly or easily; however, the emerging competition between S-VOD (subscription video-on-demand) and premium-TV suppliers might be the spark that ignites the necessary business-model transformation of the pay-TV industry.”

Indeed, something’s got to give: $200 a month for cable may end up getting some consumers pulling out their dusty old rabbit ears; that is, if they still work with digital TV.

I linked to a story just the other day which explained that one of the big reasons for the increased fees is that billionaire-owned professional sports teams are charging more and more money for the rights to broadcast their games so they can afford to pay their multimillionaire athletes. It looks like the greedy assholes who run the media and entertainment industry won't be happy until they have squeezed the last dime out of the idiots and the whole industry collapses.


Bonus: Released a half-century ago, this song is still as relevant now as it was then despite the dated references

Three More North Carolina Firms Closing

There have been quite a few mass layoff stories from North carolina as of late. Here is The Business Journal with the details:

LC Transportation Services, a Mount Airy-based trucking company that has been in business for nearly three decades, has shut its doors for good.

Saturday's closure of the trucking company — which employed 90 — comes as two other Mount Airy firms are shutting down operations.

General contractor John S. Clark, once one of the biggest commercial builders in the Triad, announced in a mid-March letter to customers that it was closing after failed negotiations for a management buyout. Harvest Time Bread Co., a national baker for the grocery and food service industries, is also closing its manufacturing plant in Mount Airy and cutting 57 local employees.

Phil Arrington, vice president of Mount Airy-based LC Transportation Services, said the company shut down due to a combination of issues, including rising fuel prices and costs for workers compensation and insurance. He also said a major customer cut their rates and contributed to the demise of the business, although he declined to name the business.

Arrington described the closing as a “death in the family,” adding that his employees were very disappointed.

“They didn’t work for us, they worked with us,” he said.

Hmmm...I wonder if that "major customer" was Walmart. If so, that wretched company is already fulfilling my prophecy of the other day about what passing on further price cuts will do to its suppliers.


Bonus: "Hell's on both ends of it...nowhere in between...this highway's mean"