Wal-Mart culpable in “accidental” hiring of illegal aliens as janitors

Morally, what’s the difference between actually doing something wrong and consciously… Morally, what’s the difference between actually doing something wrong and consciously operating in an unjust system?

If you want a watch and I tell you I can get you a brand new one for five dollars, that’s a pretty shady situation. You’d have to be pretty dull to not realize that I’m going to have to steal the watch to get it to you for that price. So, how is that different from actually stealing the watch?

On Oct. 3rd, federal agents raided 60 Wal-Marts across 21 states and arrested over 250 illegal aliens who were working as janitors in the stores. Wal-Mart, of course, is shocked and aghast at the fact that aliens were being employed to clean its floors. And it is true that Wal-Mart didn’t actually hire these workers.

What they did, and what most large-scale retailers do, is recognize that they need their stores to be clean, so they open up bidding to janitorial contractors to see who can do it cheapest. Let’s say that the most efficient – and legal – firm needs $15 per employee after taxes, social security, health benefits, etc. to do the service. The lowest bid, however, might be $10 – a shady situation. The contract goes to the $10 contractor, who says nothing illegal is going on, and that contractor then hires a subcontractor who makes similar assurances and actually hires the workers.

The retail business has two degrees of legal separation between itself and the janitors that are cleaning its floors, so that when the employees are discovered as illegal aliens, working seven nights a week without overtime pay or health benefits of any kind, the retail business can claim ignorance to the whole thing. They were simply looking out for their bottom dollar. Their contractor assured them that they would only hire legal workers. It’s not the business’s responsibility to research that claim. Who are they to question the claims of a firm that they know nothing about?

But, in the case of Wal-Mart, the argument of ignorance and good faith in contractors loses a good bit of weight when it’s realized that similar raids in 1998 and 2001 rounded up 102 illegal immigrants working at Wal-Mart, according to The New York Times.

I don’t think it’s hard to see that, from the beginning, Wal-Mart knew their approach to hiring janitors would result in them saving money by illegal practices. They entered into a system that allowed two middlemen to charge additional fees. Why do this, except to separate themselves from the actual hiring procedures? And why would they wish to be separated from the actual hiring procedures, unless they knew something illegal could be going on?

It seems to me that they either have to admit to knowing what was going on or claim to believe that subcontractors wield a powerful sort of magic which enables them to clean practically free of charge.

But, to be fair, it should be noted that this is not just a Wal-Mart problem. KMart and Target have both been shown to indirectly employ illegal immigrants. In recent years, this sort of practice has become rampant in all sorts of stores. It’s hard to say just quite how rampant, but a chart in Forbes magazine shows that while between 1992 and 2002 the number of cleaning businesses in the United States almost doubled – 57,649 to more than 100,000 – the number of people registered with the census as janitors or cleaners barely increased by five percent – from 2.1 million to 2.2 million. So, whom exactly are these 40,000 new businesses employing?

Being rampant doesn’t make it right and, when it comes down to it, there is no real difference between Wal-Mart directly hiring illegal aliens and entering into a system where eventually hiring them is a foregone conclusion. If anything, setting up such an elaborate system is more evil, more conniving, far different from the watch example where you most likely were just afraid to do it yourself. The system Wal-Mart entered into presents the impression that those responsible choose to wrong others after a long, cold, sober deliberation, and then, for no other reason than because it is less expensive to do things that way.

Questions, comments, insights or suggestions? Wminton@pittnews.com