Walmart’s scale makes it a dominant force in American culture and everyday life.

Evidence

Not only is Walmart the world’s largest private employer and retailer, it also dominates, or at least dramatically influences, culture and everyday life for hundred of millions of people in the world’s largest economy. Critics of Walmart have rightly condemned the firm for its horrendous labour practices, its creation of a highly exploitative and ecologically destructive supply chain, and the way it fundamentally transforms the retail and cultural landscape through predatory pricing that drives local and smaller businesses under. Likewise, cultural critics have taken aim at the firm’s unique, hackneyed corporate culture, which mobilizes American nostalgic idealism and Christian fundamentalism to reproduce a hyper-efficient, if ultimately ruthless, economic juggernaut. — Max Haiven, Cultures of Financialization, 47

Categorization

• XREF: The Walmart application of finance vocabulary to retail practice is a direct precursor to deWaard’s cultural argument about finance colonizing everyday life. — connects to: Walmart exemplifies and shapes everyday financialized capitalism in America. — Max Haiven, Cultures of Financialization, 246; Walmart functions as a vector stitching financialization and risk management into everyday life. — Max Haiven, Cultures of Financialization, 272; Walmart’s dominance rests partly on cultural politics of insecurity it also feeds — Max Haiven, Cultures of Financialization, 249 (+2 more)

Broader Connections

• Walmart exemplifies and shapes everyday financialized capitalism in America. #expands (0.85) — Max Haiven, Cultures of Financialization, 246
• Walmart functions as a vector stitching financialization and risk management into everyday life. #expands (0.80) — Max Haiven, Cultures of Financialization, 272
• Walmart’s dominance rests partly on cultural politics of insecurity it also feeds #corroborates (0.80) — Max Haiven, Cultures of Financialization, 249
• Vertical integration lets Walmart dictate cultural aesthetics through economic leverage #qualifies (0.75) — Max Haiven, Cultures of Financialization, 299
• Walmart synthesizes nationalism, militarism, and fear-of-terror politics into consumer space #expands (0.75) — Max Haiven, Cultures of Financialization, 297