Tax, Welfare, Wal-Mart and McDonald's

I have blogged before about Oregon tax policy that rewards the big fat cats Nike and Intel, which is a huge transfer of tax responsibility from highly profitable corporations to me and you, and continuing that train of thought we might consider Wal-Mart and McDonald's, as well as the entire food service industry, where non-union minimum wage workers are in a majority.  According to a Bloomberg article,

The two biggest welfare queens in America today are Wal-Mart and McDonald's.  According to one study, American fast food workers receive more than $7 billion dollars in public assistance. As it turns out, McDonald's has a “McResource” line that helps employees and their families enroll in various state and local assistance programs. It exploded into the public when a recording of the McResource line advocated that full-time employees sign up for food stamps and welfare. 

Wal-Mart however stands in a category by itself, being the largest private-sector employer in the U.S. and according to a study last May by the Democratic staff of the U.S. House Committee on Education and the Workforce, Wal-Mart forces its employees to use public assistance to survive, resulting in hidden taxpayer subsidies of their profits.  The study reports:

Accurate and timely data on Wal-Mart’s wage and employment practices is not always readily available.  However, occasional releases of demographic data from public assistance programs can provide useful windows into the scope of taxpayer subsidization of Wal-Mart.

After analyzing data released by Wisconsin’s Medicaid program, the Democratic staff of the U.S. House Committee on Education and the Workforce estimates that a single 300-person Wal-Mart Supercenter store in Wisconsin likely costs taxpayers at least $904,542 per year and could cost taxpayers up to $1,744,590 per year – about $5,815 per employee.  Wal-Mart’s size is nothing short of impressive. It employs more than 2 million workers worldwide. It is the nation’s largest private employer; one out of every ten retail workers in America is employed by Wal-Mart. Approximately 1.4 million Americans work at Wal-Mart.  Its workforce is double that of the U.S. Postal Service and outnumbers the populations of 96 countries. In 2012, its total revenue exceeded $469 billion, more than the gross domestic product of oil-rich Norway.  Wal-Mart reported an 8.6 percent increase in profit in the fourth quarter of 2012 and a profit margin of 4.38 percent.  In 2012, it earned $17 billion in profits.

 Wal-Mart says thank you very much as they pocket those hidden subsidies in their profits.