does Wal-Mart have an ethical obligation to increase wages and improve health care benefits for its employees? Or is Wal-Mart simply an ethically legit business operating within a capitalistic society?

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ETHICAL OBLIGATION OF WAL-MART

The focal point of the is to analyze if Wal-Mart have an ethical obligation to increase wages and improve health care benefits for its employees or is Wal-Mart simply an ethically legit business operating within a capitalistic society ? For the purpose it is important to evaluate the background of the company and its wage structure incorporated with utilitarianism ethics

It can well be stated that Wal-Mart is a retail giant . According to walmartfacts .com , Wal-Mart operates over 3

,800 facilities in the United States and more than 2 ,600 facilities overseas . More than 176 million customers per week shop at Wal-Mart . It employs over 1 .8 million associates worldwide , making the company the largest private employer in the United States . For the fiscal quarter ending in January 2006 Wal-Mart reported 312 .4 billion in sales and 3 .8 billion in net profit . In light of all this , Wal-Mart prides itself on its low prices - making products affordable to all , including the less well-off (Data supplied by customer

Wal-Mart , however , has been the target of criticism . In 2003 , for example , the company increased part-time employees from 20 percent to 40 percent . Employees are required to be available 24 hours a day and on weekends . Wal-Mart spent 1 .3 billion of its 256 billion in sales in 2003 on employee health care to insure about 45 percent of its workforce (Costco insured 96 percent . Many Wal-Mart employees cannot afford Wal-Mart 's health care package . Finally , according to 2003 statistics full-time employees make about 1 ,200 a month or 8 an hour , below the federal poverty level for a family of three (Union grocery workers earn approximately 30 percent more . Full-time Wal-Mart employees who are not self-sufficient are encouraged by the company to go on food stamps (Data supplied by customer

Under such conditions it could be stated that ethics are often called upon when making a decision , especially when the choices become a simple matter of right or wrong . In many cases , the easier choice is often the unethical one . So does that , in fact , make it wrong ? With so many differing opinions on the subject , it is hard to say for sure . One particular view allows common ethics to be thrown by the wayside in to achieve happiness for oneself . The view , or way of life for some , is known as utilitarianism . It is the belief that good is whatever brings the greatest amount of happiness to the largest amount of people thus meaning that those not included in the `largest amount of people will more than likely be left with some form of pain . That , in a broader view , is essentially what utilitarianism is - pleasure versus pain Actions are right if they promote happiness and are wrong if they produce the reverse of happiness - not just the happiness of the performer of the action but also that of everyone affected by it Through the years the theory has...