R: Walmart is Bad for America

Wednesday, September 21st, 2016 at 7:30 p.m. in the Berkeley Mendenhall Room

Camille Pissarro, Rue de l'Epicerie, Rouen (Effect of Sunlight), 1898, oil on canvas, 81.3 x 65.1 cm, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

Citizens often associate the American Dream with the flourishing of small businesses, operated by families and supported by local communities. Certainly, this ideal seems to promote autonomy and civic engagement. Yet it may also result in inefficiency and a lack of resources for development.

Does big business provide a solution compatible with American culture? Is the Walmart ethos of expansion and reducing costs consistent with the American ideals of innovation and the free market, or does it result in a lack of individuality and the rise of destructive consumerism? Will big business result in homogenous communities, or will it allow for a new use and distribution of resources?