for their effort, training, experience, etc. may not be such a bad idea but the real world doesn't work that way. Do you think there's anything particularly challenging in Britney Spears' work? Do you think a trained monkey would have a hard time playing Nelly for a day? People get paid shit at WalMart because WalMart can get away with paying people shit, plain and simple.

With the industrial base in America declining dramatically there are only so many jobs that someone without a college degree or technical accreditation can do. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe WalMart is the largest single employer in the US. As such, it has a moral responsibility to pay its employees a living wage, regardless of minimum wage laws. What we need is a return to the Keynesian ideals of a living wage and full employment in order to take full advantage of the human resources in this great country of yours.

Paying people only enough to survive at the basest level is economically inefficient. The US rates sixteenth among industrialized nations on the UN's Human Poverty Index; given its massive natural resource advantages and lack of enemies it should be number one. Paying people shit at WalMart is a symptom of a much larger problem.