Quote:
Originally Posted by Ninjalawyer
Everyone complains when a Walmart moves into their town, but no one ever thinks about the cost to consumers of blocking that Walmart and forcing everyone to pay higher prices to subsidize the mom and pop stores. Again, maybe instead of complaining about multinationals, we should raise taxes for everyone and give all small business owners a "thanks for trying" subsidy; that would be more efficient than blocking the Walmart, probably be cheaper, and spare everyone's feelings.
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In my region, consumers welcomed WalMart and Sam's Club. Both are doing gangbusters business.
So are most of the local competitors; several actually found ways of under-cutting Walmart pricing by tapping the global supply chain to bring in merchandise from India, Brazil, and eastern europe. The end result is that available *variety* of products went way up and consumers have more choices. Some shops *have* closed. But their locales have been snapped up by other entrepreneurs for new types of businesses.
Right now CVS is making a push into town, challenging Walgreens and putting added pressure on local independent pharmacies. The indies' answer? They've joined up in a loose association to pool their buying power and increase their inventory range. Some are expanding to meet the challenge. Some indies *have* gone out of business but the rest are looking stronger and have snapped up all the laid-off staff. (Health care is a growth business.)
Very Darwinian.
Adding aggressive competitors to a market only reduces the roster of consumer choices when the existing players are incompetent, lazy, or so hidebound they refuse to adapt and thus cease to compete.
In the end, it comes back to "competitors compete, losers whine".