Hightower Lowdown

I've been chastised by Wal- Mart!

Imagine my distress. The largest corporation in the world apparently was stung by one of my recent commentaries. I had pointed out that Wal-Mart, which touts itself as a model of "free-market" success, actually has built its market muscle in large part by milking us taxpayers, having squeezed more than a billion dollars in subsidies from state and local governments, giving it a competitive advantage to clobber local businesses.

In response, Sarah Clark, director of corporate communications at WallyWorld, fired off a missive to media outlets that carried my Wal-Mart commentary. She asserted that it was "full of inaccuracies." Was the key figure of one billion dollars in taxpayer giveaways to Wal-Mart inaccurate? No, she didn't dispute it.

Rather, Wal-Mart's chief PR flack said that the company is a generous corporate citizen. "In the past ten years," Ms. Clark informs us indignantly,"Wal-Mart has paid $4 billion in property taxes alone...." But wait—it owed those taxes! This was not a "contribution," but a debt. Other businesses pay property taxes, too, yet they don't get a billion bucks in special subsidies. Then Ms. Clark notes that her company "generated $52 billion in sales taxes." But wait again—that's not Wal-Mart's money. It's money that local consumers paid to finance public services. This money is also the result of sales that the monopolistic giant took from local businesses. Wal-Mart doesn't expand a community's buying power—it just redistributes purchases from other stores to itself.

But Ms. Clark presses on, claiming that "Wal-Mart has remitted $192 million" in wage taxes. Once more, however, this money is not a voluntary contribution from a goodhearted company—it's taken out of the employees' wages, as required by law.

To see how Wal-Mart does indeed milk taxpayers, go to www.goodjobsfirst.org.