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Biggest yes, but
perhaps the worst employer: Wal-Mart is now the largest company Wal-Mart is now the largest company in the United States and the world. It passed Exxon Mobil, the oil company, on the 2002 Fortune 500 list, which has just been published. An aggressive discounter, Wal-Mart builds its success on exploiting its 1.2 million workers, most of whom are paid far below collective agreement levels and many of whom lack health care insurance and other normal benefits. Most of Wal-Mart's operations are still in the United States, although the Arkansas based company has showed a growing interest towards investing abroad. Asda, the British subsidiary, has done ok - analysts say that this is because it is still Asda, Wal-Mart has not imposed its operating concept on the company. However, Wal-Mart has failed to seriously threaten Tesco's leading position in British supermarket and superstore retailing. In Germany, Wal-Mart has not been successful. Its concept has not worked well and the company has continued to generate major losses, amounting to hundreds of millions of US dollars. Labour relations have been strained as Wal-Mart has not wanted to adapt to the German way of regulating working life through dialogue, collective bargaining and worker participation. Recently, Wal-Mart made its first inroads to Japan by purchasing a major minority post in the country's number three supermarket retailer Seiyu. To build up a profitable operation in Japan will not be easy for the US multinational, particularly if the American managers stick to their usual approach to the workers and their trade unions. Not everyone in Wal-Mart is low-paid. The main owners, who are heirs to company founder Sam Walton, appear routinely at the top of the list of the world's richest individuals. Recently, the share owners gave themselves a gift of an extra 2 cents per share in dividends - for the Walton family, this adds up to an extra 36 million USD.
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