Wal-Mart has decided to endorse ObamaCare by backing a mandate that employers provide health insurance for their employees. The corporation’s motives for its attempt at regulatory profiteering are self-evident. Wal-Mart is seeking to curry favor with the liberal protest groups plaguing it for the last several years by buying political protection from the Obama administration. In the process, it also can gain a short-term competitive advantage over its rivals who spend less on health insurance than Wal-Mart, and who are less able to utilize economies of scale when “reform” would force the purchase of one-size fits all government-approved employee coverage that would remove the competitors’ current advantage.
Cognizant of Wal-Mart’s destructive motives, the National Retail Federation trade group, which represents retailers other than Wal-Mart, launched a counter attack against Wal-Mart’s endorsement. As with most attempts to use the club of government power against business rivals, Wal-Mart will eventually learn that Winston Churchill was correct about socialism: It results in the equal sharing of misery. Indeed, Sam Walton must be rolling in his grave.
