From a moderately successful retailer to one of the largest retailers in the world Wal-Mart has grown right before our very eyes. As America’s largest employer, Wal-Mart employs over “1.6 million employees” (Wakeup Wal-Mart, 2010). With that said one would assume that this Fortune 500 Company would have a respectable compensation and or benefit plan for their hard working employees, but sadly this is not the case. Unfortunately although Wal-Mart is famously known for their ridiculously price they are also well known for providing disastrous healthcare coverage plans to their employees.
For instance Wal-Mart offers low premiums to their employees for their family coverage. Even though this may seem like a dream come true for many, the fact of the matter is that their high annual deductable cancels low premiums out. In fact, theses annual deductibles are so high that most employees find themselves having to pay thousands of dollars before Wal-Mart’s insurance decides to kick in to pay. Regrettably because of this many employees are forced to seek government help in the form of Medicaid and other subsidized care in order to obtain and afford their medical needs. What is even more alarming though is the way Wal-Mart plans to right their employee healthcare wrongs. To offset their current health care plans, Wal-mart executive are proposing the cutting of “retirement benefits by at least $200 million (by eliminating flat 401(k) retirement contributions, which would cut the company’s retirement benefit cost from four to three percent of wage”(West, 2005). The reasoning behind why Wal-marts executives implement such ridiculous and unethical plans are unknown, but there is no question their sense of logic is more than a bit disturbing.
