What do Governor Scott Walker and Walmart have in common? They talk pay raises in public while cheating their workers of pay.
When Walmart announced with great fanfare that it was boosting pay for frontline workers, CMD questioned the spin. After all, Walmart is regularly forced to pay back wages between 2007-2012 amounting to an astonishing $30 million according to a US Senate report. This week, Bloomberg reported that Walmart is cutting hours for its workers, robbing many of the benefit of the recent pay hike.
In July, Scott Walker raised eyebrows when he signed a contract with a big pay boost for the state troopers who provide his security detail. The troopers did not get the 17 percent he proposed, but a more modest $4 an hour raise. Now the US Department of Labor has found that Team Walker violated the law by failing to pay overtime for state troopers who provide round-the-clock security as Walker jets around the country seeking the presidency. The troopers’ pay raise has been rescinded and the security detail is being cut. Taxpayers could be on the hook for as much as $1 million. Perhaps “always low wages” should be the slogan for the candidate who recently called the minimum wage a “lame” idea.
Check out PR Watch’s SourceWatch profile of the low-road, low-wage Walmart here.
We’re not backing down in the face of Trump’s threats.
As Donald Trump is inaugurated a second time, independent media organizations are faced with urgent mandates: Tell the truth more loudly than ever before. Do that work even as our standard modes of distribution (such as social media platforms) are being manipulated and curtailed by forces of fascist repression and ruthless capitalism. Do that work even as journalism and journalists face targeted attacks, including from the government itself. And do that work in community, never forgetting that we’re not shouting into a faceless void – we’re reaching out to real people amid a life-threatening political climate.
Our task is formidable, and it requires us to ground ourselves in our principles, remind ourselves of our utility, dig in and commit.
As a dizzying number of corporate news organizations – either through need or greed – rush to implement new ways to further monetize their content, and others acquiesce to Trump’s wishes, now is a time for movement media-makers to double down on community-first models.
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