Wal-Mart: We're in charge now, let us fix things

As a former Wal-Mart employee (summer of 1999) I have some perspective on how the company used to work.

Health care was a joke. I consistently worked more than 40 hours a week, but because I was a 'part time' employee, I was never paid overtime. And the city I lived in -- Orlando, Florida -- is a worse place because it grew alongside Wal-Mart.

I don't think the Wal-Mart model is a good model. But I do believe that, since they've pretty much taken over the (retail) world, when they do good things it has gigantic impacts.

And now Wal-Mart's CEO seems to think that his company is ushering in a Utopia.

He's promising to decrease the company's greenhouse gases significantly while forcing its suppliers to make their products up to 25% more efficient. He wants to make health care affordable for Wal-Mart employees, and for its suppliers' employees, and for all of America.

He went even further to say that Wal-Mart is working with major car companies on electric vehicle initiatives, hinting that the retail giant may someday place wind turbines in its parking lots so that people can charge their EVs renewably.

That would be pretty cool.

CEO Lee Scott says that we live in a world where we no longer have faith in the government to make positive changes. So Wal-Mart is making that change their responsibility. OMG, do I live in a country where people have more faith in Wal-Mart than their government?

It's great that they're working to be a more environmental company. But does this sound kinda scary to anyone else?

Almost like we're on the edge of being governed more by corporations than by government?

Well, I guess that's a story for another blog. At EcoGeek we just have to be happy they're thinking about the environment for a change.

Read more at the NYTimes and see the speech from Wal-Mart