Who do you think it greedy ?

The richest family in the world, the Walton's are wealthy because of stock ownership in Walmart. WalMart, for decades, have operated on a 3-4% net profit margin. 96-97% of the revenue they generate goes to someone else, i.e. labor/product producers. The idea that this cash is being funnelled into rich people's bank accounts, like Scrooge McDuck hoarding gold, is just ignorance.

If you own 50% of a million dollar business that enjoys a 4% net profit in a year, are you under the impression that your holdings are worth 40,000 ?

Anyway, just to be clear, you're saying that to argue that rich people lobby for tax dollars is ignorant ?

The cognitive dissonance here is amazing.

You mean to tell me that basically none of the world's richest people have a huge proportion of their net worth in literal cash?

Um.....$0.96-97. of every dollar Walmart gets goes to other people that's not their shareholders, and they typically have the cheapest prices in town. Walmart is successful because they don't reap a substantial amount of cash from profit margins, but rather by selling more things. Amazon operates at between 2-3%. You take away all the government subsidies, they would still operate at that margin, they would generate less revenue, consequently those people who get 97% of the revenue will see less revenue as well.

I'm not sure what you think you're arguing against that makes this factoid at all relevant. Whose post is refuted by the fact that only 3-4% of Walmart's revenue gets funneled to shareholders? And whatever post that was, do you think its author was previously unaware that Walmart pays other companies for products?

Also, this speaks well to RFlush's original point:

That Walmart can have the cheapest prices in town is a great example. They do this by paying workers as little as possible! They get their employees on public benefits so that Walmart can spend less money paying them. This is an indirect wealth transfer to the Walton family: the federal government gives tax dollars to Walmart workers that the Waltons then don't have to.

This is exactly what he was talking about (right down to it being an honorable pastime - the Waltons can then be revered as heroes of capitalism in threads such as this!).

Walmart's business model does not rely on funnelling government money to their shareholders. Their model is entirely based on selling the most things, not generating the most profit. Same with Amazon. Telsa, on the other hand, that would be good example of business that stayed afloat entirely due to government subsidies.

You do understand there is no difference, right? Whether the money is coming from Walmart or the government....the worker is in the same spot in the socioeconomic ladder. However, if you want to talk about taking away food stamps/welfare, which I'm not in favor of, then you just might be a conservative.

Yes. However, the point of this current discussion is about the Walton family and their relationship to those tax dollars.

They'd still be among the wealthiest people in society. Selling a lot of things cheaply is a great business model.

Jeopardy time.

Answer: Something that is respectable for rich people but not poor people.

Question:

stimulation

Right. And they do things like open more stores and invest in internet sales and do stock buybacks and all sorts of things which cause their share prices to rise and their owners to snowball wealth while avoiding taxes.

Bolded is a bit inaccurate.

Walmart operates at a gross profit margin of 24%.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/...%20electronics.

Costco operates at a gross profit margin of 11%, and yet manages to treat their workers much better.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/...gin-worldwide/

I think it's pretty weak to use Gross Profit Margin because it excludes capex which is money spent and given to other people who are not shareholders.

I'm not sure what you're arguing here. Share holders get a dividend which is part of the profit.

The Walton family owns a controlling interest of WMT. That means they can literally sell of any or all of their property or hard assets at anytime and have that paid to them in real money.

Sure in order to run a business you have to move money through it but that doesn't mean you don't still own the business.

Anyway, I still would like to know who you were saying was greedy above ?
Because I really can't tell if you think it's the poor people who want to do better or the middle class people who have been trained to compete with everyone else. I don't think there's a wrong answer I just didn't get your response. I assume you don't think it's the rich because you're always running cover for them.

And I was also wondering why you threw this particular example into the conversation. Wouldn't a charter school or private prison be a better fit ?
Afaik the government isn't in the retail gig.

LOL

Yes.

As well as being unemployed.

But that was my point. They roll the money back into the business and profit via the value of their holdings going up.

Stimulation works to stimulate economic activity, but it's funded with debt, and no amount of stimulation pays the cost of stimulation (see broken window fallacy. Debt being the window) What the left seems to ignore, or does not realize is, our quality/standard of life is largely fueled by government debt.

Like, our poor people are richer than some other countries poor people. Same with our middle class. Same with our wealthiest. Every dollar the government gives to poor people to spend, or every entitlement that a poor person does not have to spend money on (i.e. Obama phones) increases everyone's standard/quality of life, including the Waltons.

The issue is, all of this is funded with debt. For the most part, having debt you are never going to pay, as we are with a fiat currency, is not an issue per se, until you exceed some unknown threshold where runaway inflation occurs.

That's why you need fiscal conservatives, to make sure the free spending left does not get ahead of themselves.

Okay, but there are many benefactors to that, not just the Waltons.

Profit Margin isn't all given to shareholders either.

You seem to be trying to make an argument that because investors have to pay to have other people work so they can make a profit they can't be greedy.

Is that close to your point ?

I think greedy is a subjective term. I don't think reaping $0.03 of every dollar they get is greedy. I don't think a business that repurposes $0.97 of every dollar to someone other than shareholders is greedy either. I don't think ownership in a company being extremely valuable is greedy either. Those folks are only wealthy becasue of what someone else will pay for that share, which takes you into the reasons why that share is valuable to someone. It's not becasue they generate huge margins, it's because they sell a lot of things. It's because walmart sells the most things. I don't get the sense someone is being greedy when they are essentially selling things people want at the lowest margins.