A Union Blog and Logic

One of my favorite blogs to laugh at is the wake up Wal Mart. Now while I am not a huge fan of Wal-Mart. I am a fan of logic and common sense.

The most recent fiasco Wake Up WM, a union sponsered blog, was on the health issues in the US.

The union (AFL-CIO) curses the darkness of what WM does bad on health care. Rather then encourage WM to improve in a way that makes business sense they want the world for nothing.

First, they whine about the low cost RX that is provided for by WM. The complaint: there are not enough drugs lowered and most people do not take these drugs. Reply: I take two of them. At least WM is lighting a candle instead of cursing the darkness.


Second WM wants some walk in health clinics. These are not drug rehab centers, they are walk in clinics. then they whine that WM (well not WM but the contracted company) is closing them. Why? becasue they are not making enough money. So again the union curses the darkness. WM is at least trying.

They complain that Wally-World wants to make gobs and gobs of money. Let's look at this. The unions do not understand the differance between gross and net profits. Yes, WM makes more then anyone else. And for good reason. The problem, WM works on 4% margins. If you want proof look at the Wal-Mart stocks. They have a P/E of under 19. The stock varies between 42 and 60 over the past five years. This means that WM is a stable investment that pays the stock holders. Read the stock holders as the owners.

Music and Food

Someone wrote in response to the linked article:

Plenty of ink has been spilled in arguments over the proper business model for music in the P2P age. The publishers generally want to hold onto the current market-based system, but there are voices in the wilderness arguing that a compulsory license model actually makes the most sense for both artists and consumers. One of those voices is Steven Page, singer and guitarist for the Barenaked Ladies, who recently spoke to Ars about this issue and called for an ISP-based licensing model that would allow consumers access to all the music they want and would ensure that artists get paid. But the US Register of Copyrights, Marybeth Peters, calls this a bad idea.

To which someone else replied:


Ok so compulsory license artists get paid and you can download what you want when you want DRM free.
Explain to me why this should NOT apply to medicine, food and housing as well as public transportation?
What people never get is we are moving toward that type of society. People produce and share the product. It allows more freedom as well.
Got a band or movie, post it, no more big media calling the shots. Just smaller decentralized producers.
Corporations are caving in from their own weight and lack of innovation.
Now I'll sit back and wait for the Socialism/Communism comparisons and claims of evil.


To Which I Reply:

I do not need to mention Communism as you already did. So I will tackle the food issue.

There is a significant difference between food and music.

Let's look at the models: For Music, a group or person goes, one time, to a studio and cuts a track. This track is then made into a format for the masses (MP3), one time, and is distributed for free across the world.

Who does the work?
The record producer. (one time)
The sound person. (one time)
The studio. (one time)

All these people can be paid by the artist(s), one time, a negotiated cash amount for their labor.

The artist(s). How do they get paid? They go on concert and sell t-shirts and tickets and other junk. The artist no longer has to pay for distribution of the music. The music sells itself.

For Food: I live in a rural farming community (though I am not farmer).

Each year, not just one time, the farmer must go out and plow up the field.

Each year, not just one time, the farmer must go out and purchase seeds.

Each year, not just one time, the farmer must plant seeds.

Each year, not just one time, the farmer must care for the crops.

Each year, not just one time, the farmer must harvest crops.

Each year, not just one time, the farmer must transport the crops to a market area.

Each year, not just one time, the farmer must maintain equipment.

Each year, not just one time, the farmer must buy petrol for the equipment.

The musician spends $500 for a guitar, and about $5,000 in other equipment. Maybe some money for Studio RTA Furniture.

The smallest farm has over a $1,000,000 worth of equipment and stock and other issues. Most farms have several million worth of equipment.

The odds of a artist being killed or maimed by a guitar string breaking are small.

The odds of a farmer being killed or maimed on the farm is high. I have never seen so many people missing a finger or a limb as I have while living here.

The long term potential payoff for the artist is: fame and fortune.

The long term potential payoff for the farmer is: poverty and a missing limb.

And for the record: the farm payments that we always hear about have been gone since the 1980s. The only payments left are for those who set aside land to go back to nature. And that only pays for the taxes on the land.

This includes one small section of getting food to a person so they can eat.

I will not mention: the processing plants, the FDA regs, the distribution channels, the sales people, the retailers, and a host of other people involved.

This is why we cannot have such a simple and easy model for food as can exist for music.


And FWIW this does apply to public transportation through taxes.