Walmart did not start out being the gateway for Chinese crap.
In 1985, amid anxiety about trade deficits and the loss of American manufacturing jobs, Walton launched a “Made in America” campaign that committed Wal-Mart to buying American-made products if suppliers could get within 5 percent of the price of a foreign competitor……..
When Walton died in 1992, the adjustment to a post-Sam environment proved difficult. Although Wal-Mart executives had emphasized for years that their company depended on a set of principles and habits more than it did on any one person, Walton’s death wound up marking a fateful shift in how the company was perceived.
The first blow fell only months later when “Dateline NBC” produced an exposé on the company’s sourcing practices. Although Wal-Mart’s “Made in America” campaign was still nominally in effect, “Dateline” showed that store-level associates had posted “Made in America” signs over merchandise actually produced in far away sweatshops History of Walmart
In any case, people can become complacent and unaware. It is makes it easier to gradually change things so it goes unnoticed, until then suddenly there’s a big change and little you can do about it.
