So the last 6 places I have been in I haven't worn a mask. Went into Kroger with my wife with no masks. Literally everyone else wearing one. Living in state with no mask mandate as well. Just remember if they want to kick you out, shop somewhere else, start leaving nasty reviews. Done with this nonsense.
I haven't been wearing a mask outdoors since covid but have been wearing a mask to enter in places. I am done with this BS. Going to be maskless forever now. This is all about control.
Walmart also uses their size and power to get lower prices from manufacturers, etc. They also buy in large bulk quantity which further helps reduce their cost. Walmart typically increases the price in stores on items, sometimes up to 20 times more than what they paid.
An example would be years ago a TV that was $168 at the time, since I worked many years in shipping locally and internationally, I knew how to look up information from barcodes on the box. That TV came from a shipment where the cost of each TV was just under $9.
Walmart is notoriously bad about this type of crooked shit. Walmart also gets rid of registers and cashiers more and more, year after year. Many Walmarts use self driving floor cleaners and inventory robot things.
Walmart is running a pilot program with self driving shopping carts at select stores. The shopping carts will drive themselves back to the store where the carts go. The shopping cart will be able to be used with the Walmart app so that the cart drives itself to the location in store of the selected item on the app.
They're also getting it to where people can pay with their phone and app while shopping, pay as you shop I guess. This will be yet another way to reduce registers and even self checkouts. With fewer self checkouts, they'll need fewer employees to monitor self checkouts.
I love technology but the human to human experience while shopping is important to society. We are supposed to be social creatures. We're not supposed to shop with phones, have everything delivered to home and you know there's plenty of delivery robots being used now days as well.
These places like Walmart and Amazon want to have a few human jobs as possible. Robots don't ask for raises or time off or breaks or health insurance or anything.
I don't really think human-to-human experience in shopping is that important -- I don't particularly go to Walmart to socialize the way I do the corner mart. It's certainly not essential to my shopping experience. In fact, I don't think I've ever had a pleasant conversation with the trash that works at that store. I prefer to get my human interaction at the Moose lodge (although that can be a bit awkward now that I understand that patriots should remain sober.)
What scares me about Walmart's mechanization is that they've driven out almost every small business here in Western MD, and even most of the big businesses. So now they're going to obsolete the workers? We need low-skill work or this town will die..
I meant more in general about the human to human experience. Shopping at Publix here in FL is far more pleasant than at Walmart. I do believe one day Walmart will fall but how soon is anyone's guess.
I'll never try to tell anyone what to do but I believe drinking alcohol is not the best of choices. Bars are often trouble, especially when full of drunk people. For someone that wants a few drinks from time to time that should be totally fine but staying sober in life is truly the best way to be.
Walmart's power comes from small cities where they can kill the competition. In big cities Walmart doesn't have that much power because of all the competition. How to fix that problem, I wouldn't know offhand.