Wednesday, April 13, 2005

Big Hairy Deal

I am not a big fan of Wal-Mart. For lots of reasons. I have promised to do a long form version on this blog sometime. I'm not ready yet. I already have spoken of it on the Dakota Revision blog I maintain. You can read it there. More will follow.

Today's news was all apoplectic about $35 million dollars Wal-Mart was going to give over 10 years for conservation restoration. In Dumb Dakota Kid math that comes out to $3.5 Mil a year. Wal-Mart made NET profits last year of $8 BILLION dollars. 8 bil/3.5mil. If you made $40,000 last year that would be the same as if you threw $20 bucks in the bucket to save the ducks or something. A good thing to do, but not a big deal. The proportional relationship is exactly the same. Where was Katie Couric then?

I wonder if anyone will follow up 10 years from now and see if it really happened. We have such an ADD focus capacity in this country I would place even money it never happens. Remember Ted Turner giving a Billion Dollars away in the late 90's (Over the next 10 years). OOOPS. Market went down. Didn't happen. Katie??

So, big spender, I'm with Shania on this one, "You don't impress me much"

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