This is one of those things when you just can't quite come to grips with as far as its veracity. Even assuming it's all true, it just doesn't seem to line up. Add to that the obvious lack of the full picture as a result of of making vague claims, and what we end up with is something incomplete at best and deceptive at worst.
Regarding the first claim, I googled "80% wal mart food stamps" and could find no news report that documented this assertion. In fact the first 20 listings were left-wing websites. And several of the advertisements which appear when you do searches were government ads seeking foodstamp enrollees. Which suggests, of course, that government WANTS people to be on foodstamps. And it appears they are pretty successful, since I did find that 51% of the nation is on food stamps. So I wonder what the problem is that so many Wal Mart employees are supposedly on food stamps. Isn't that a good thing?
So Wal Mart gets $2.66 billion of government help. I googled this as well, and a bunch more left-wing sites came up. It appears that this claim is related to the first claim, just recalculated and then attributed to "help" that Wal Mart is supposedly getting. I thought at first that the "help" was tax breaks, infrastructure, and that sort of thing, but no one was claiming that. Apparently, Wal Mart pays its employees too little and as a result the government "helps" by making up the difference.
But my wife works at Wal Mart, and she notes that Wal Mart surveys the local economy of the towns where their stores are located to determine the prevailing wage, then adjusts that number upward to attract quality employees. In other words, Wal Mart researches the environment and then competes for employees by offering higher wages. My wife has worked for them for nearly 6 years, and has gotten promotions, raises, and bonuses every year. She has great benefits and working environment. Plus, when she was out for 11 weeks after shoulder surgery, they saved a job for her. It's really too bad that real-world examples like this are not more available to counter the capitalist-hating, success-bashing leftist meme.
Regarding Medicaid, well, this is another undocumented claim that I cannot locate the source of. Wal Mart has several great health insurance plans that are relatively inexpensive and have good coverage. Not everyone qualifies, of course, but that is the rules of the game: You know them, and you agree to work for Wal Mart or any other business based on the terms offered. And with the onerous requirements the government places on businesses the size of Wal Mart, it's a wonder they offer coverage at all.
Context, however, is everything. There is little we can discern about this compilation of "facts" about Wal Mart. We do not know how they calculated their figures or what they included. We can be sure, however, that the purpose of this is to continue to fan the flames of resentment about the success of Wal Mart, and truly, any excuse will do. Check out the links I provided, which offer some counterpoint to the nonsense promulgated by the Left.
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