Wal-Mart Is Against Women!

In March 2011, Wal-Mart, the largest private employer, was taken to the Supreme Court to hear arguments about women being discriminated against because of their gender. Betty Dukes, an employee since 1994 and one of the 7 main women in the suit, talks about how women, including herself, would get paid less then men with lower seniority and be overlooked for managerial positions.  Christine Kwapnoski, another of the seven women, said her boss told her the male employee received the job because he had a family to support. It is said that 80% of women are hourly supervisors, one-third of women are part of store management, and the statistics continue to get smaller as you move into Wal-Mart corporate management.

Wal-Mart is one of the largest business success stories but they seem to be discriminating against women. I do considered women in retail as businesswomen because I feel that they are apart of the business community too. I had trouble reading that a boss gave a male employee a promotion because he had to provide for his family. Most women these days are divorced or single and trying to provide for their families too. Why is there a difference between a male or female providing for his or her family?  It is unfair how women can work in a higher or equal position than there male counterparts, yet receive lower pay. Women are also being prevented from holding manager jobs and moving into upper management roles. Gender discrimination is unfortunately a way we are seeing women not being able to succeed. These women can become great businesswomen if they are given the chance to move into higher management positions and continue up the Wal-Mart Corporate ladder.  If they are not getting the opportunity, we will continue to see women unable to move up in the business world.


2 Responses to “Wal-Mart Is Against Women!”
  1. brennamcnabb says:

    I’d like to start off by saying I’m really glad you wrote a post on the Wal-Mart Discrimination case. I haven’t heard any coverage of it since March so I was excited to hear the controversy come to light again. Although, I also would have appreciated a summary of how the case played out. I researched it on my own and found that the case was dismissed due to large of a group (nation-wide, female Wal-Mart employees) with too little connection. Also NPR and NYT hinted it might not have been Wal-Mart the corporation’s discrimination rather the bosses and higher management with the thinking that “women are less likely to be willing to move their family for a higher job.”

    I believe that the actual store Wal-Mart isn’t to blame (maybe partially for hiring the gender discriminating idiots), but also the higher employees doing the hiring and promotions. I agree with the sediment that discrimination limits women, but I think there is a reason women “want” to work at Wal-Mart. The hours are really flexible (they don’t want full time workers) so I think that most “single mothers” are probably looked as having trouble with longer, less flexible hours. That being said, I’m not condoning the actions of discrimination what so ever. But I think it’s important to at least try to look at both sides of the issue (or at least their defence of their actions). Again thanks for a great post and on a thoughtful issue!

    Undefined Feminist


  2. copel102 says:

    I do agree with what you have say. I recently put up new information on the Walmart case that is going on in California. You should check it out.

Leave a Reply


WordPress.com Logo


Google photo


Twitter picture


Facebook photo


Connecting to %s

%d bloggers like this: