Vote In Round Two Of The Worst Company In America Competition!
Two battles of the titans rage unabated this weekend as Round 2 of the Worst Company in American Competition rolls on. In the first bracket, insurance calamity and economy ruiner AIG is squaring off against senior-poisoner Peanut Corporation of America. Over in the second bracket, the porn thieves at Best Buy are trying to steal victory from Walmart's underpriced helper claw.
Vote inside now or we'll assume you like all of these wonderful companies!
#8 Best Buy VS #9 Walmart:
#1 AIG VS #17 Peanut Corporation of America:
This is a post in our Worst Company In America 2009 series. The companies nominated for this honor were chosen by you, the readers, and seeded according to number of nominations. Keep track of all the goings on at consumerist.com/tag/worst-company-in-america. Download the bracket here.
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Comments:
Wal Mart VS Best Buy
they're both good I guess this boils down to customer service
in that case Wal Mart wins
Does this mean I can vote twice??
I understand why most gut feelings are with AIG, but the Peanut Corporation knew there was a problem and ignored, causing people to die. AIG may have killed financial futures but their death toll is less than the peanut people.
@SOS_Hunter: This is true, but on the other hand, AIG acted on a much larger scale. There is some amount of economic destruction which equals in badness the loss of a smaller number of lives. Where we draw that line is a judgment call, but reducing the quality of life of hundreds of millions if not billions of people, from a pure consequences standpoint, is pretty awful.
why is AIG winning!?
money can never amount to human lives.. and nothing can compare to KNOWING you could have saved them but you decided not to...
Walmart is worse than Best Buy. I personally am willing to shop at Best Buy at least a few times a year. I am willing to shop at Walmart 0 times a year.
And PCA is pretty bad, but they didn't take our tax money and run like AIG, so I say FUCK AIG and voted for them as worse.
@huadpe: I can't buy a new car this year. That sucks.
...
Tonight, someone is thinking about their loved one who is now dead and buried.
Here is how I see it...
AIG vs PCA
While there is no doubt PCA is very wrong and very at fault for what has happened, I don't feel they are the worse evil of the two. How many 70 year old grandparents are being forced back into work because of the crap AIG pulled? How many people are suffering on a daily basis because of the financial crisis caused by the pure greed of this company? Now they take our money and run to the bank laughing.
It seems petty when you compare it to loss of life thanks to PCA, but the effects of AIG will be more long term to see the whole results of what they have done.
Best Buy vs Walmart
Best Buy is certainly the more evil company. Walmart provides jobs for a lot of people, and not offer them cheap health care, which granted, has a good sized deductible, but it's better than having nothing at all. They also provide competitive prices when it comes to grocery and everyday needs, which comes very in handy when things get tough financially on people like they are now. I suggest anyone who has anything against Walmart watch Penn and Teller's Bullshit episode they did on Walmart.
Best Buy on the other hand is a regular on this site, and that's not a good thing. How many complaints come up when comparing the two companies? Best Buy is one of those companies that not only screw the consumers, they screw the employees as well. That old Best Buy Sucks website was full of stories from employees who were getting the shaft daily from this company when all they wanted was a good job. Everything from people being fired for trying to help a customer from blatantly telling them to lie to customers.
I will never shop at Best Buy.
I think that PCA is worse, because no matter how big of a shit move they pulled, AIG's fuck-over was one that will eventually be paid for. The PCA directly caused people to die.
@SMSDHubbard: And no one in a state of financial devastation ever commits suicide or anything to 'save' their families, of course.
@SMSDHubbard: Exactly. I feel like people who think the deaths aren't as important kind of miss the point that money doesn't matter as much as actual lives. Sure it will affect our buying abilities but does anyone think it will really get to a point where you can't even buy basic essentials like food?
Wow this is tough. These are all deserving competitors who have turned in first-tier performances.
We know in our heart of hearts that the losers in these pairings deserve to be here and could best many many of our other competitors. In these pairings, unfortunately, there will just have to be some prime competitors knocked out of the race.
@Jrhu: You can choose from the company responsible for killing several people or the responsible for several suicides.
@Jrhu: I voted Peanut corp because AIG has many corporate branches that aren't evil,
but I hate the argument that "money can never amount to human lives". Lets spend billions on a piece of technology and if it saves one life is a line I have heard to many times and it makes me sick.
That is a tough choice, and surely both companies deserve to win. I chose Walmart over Best Buy because (despite what we've all been reading) I haven't had a bad experience there myself. Walmart on the other hand has screwed me several times and I know they treat their employees worse.
@SOS_Hunter:If you want to talk about ramifications of these Corp's actions, sure Peanut Corp can be directly implicated in a number of deaths due to willful neglect (in China they would shoot these bastards dead after a speedy trial).
But AIG's actions can be both directly and idirectly linked to a massive economic holocaust that has cost tens of thousands of people their homes, jobs, saving and businesses, not only in this country but around the world. They have direly impacted exponentially more folks that Peanut Corps ever could.
And if you think AIG haven't cost lives, we can hypothesize not only about the folks who might take their own lives over this (as noted above), and perhaps the lives of their loved ones (who hasn't read of a number of domestic "murder/suicides" in recent months), but also the number of people who no longer have employer-provided medical benefits and cannot get proper health care, and are therefore prone to the ravages of any number of maladies, some of which will be terminal.
In the long run, I'd guess without fear of contradiction that AIG has wracked up a much larger 'Butcher's Bill".
As much as I hate AIG...
AIG was stupid.
PBCA was malicious (keeping the product on the market when it was known to be unsafe).
Why is AIG beating PBCA when PBCA is clearly worse?!?!?!?
PBCA KILLED people!
And while I'm glad Wal-Mart is ahead of Best Buy, I can't believe BB isn't getting trounced by the evil that is Wal-Mart. Come on! Wal-Mart locks in people to keep them working, deletes overtime to avoid paying out, and pressures manufacturers to cut costs to the point of collapse. And lest we forget - lead tainted dishes!
Remember walmart has a documentary on how bad it is. AIG stole billions from the taxpayers.
@simplegreen:
No, I hate being charged 300%, that's why I don't shop there. But you know what I hate more than being charged 300%? Mortgaging my country to China!!! Walmart wins.
Ever wonder why AIG got so much money and why Congress promised the employees bonuses? Do a little research and you will find that AIG is responsible for the retirement portfolios of Congress. AIG didnt steal American taxpayer money, they were given it by the democrats in congress, which is funny since they all pretended to be shocked when news about the bonuses started spreading. The Democrats voted to provide the bonuses and it was approved by Obama. Do the research. Congress should be going against PCA instead of AIG
I'm really split on the AIG vs. PCA, but the BestBuy vs. Walmart is easy. Walmart, all the way. Their stores are disgusting, they cause the mom and pops to go, and if I want electronics in town I've got plenty of options besides Best Buy.
Fuck Walmart.
@Dancin' Hooooomeeeeeer!: come on homer... Bernie is responsible for more trauma and death than AIG...
Peanut Corp broke laws and killed people... AIG made risky investments, and THE GOVERNMENT chose to bail them out - which in turn made them unpopular.
and Best Buy has the rep of poor customer service, over inflated prices, and tech support that steals data and misleads customers.... Walmart only strong-arms vendors and undercut more expensive competitors left and right...
Peanut Corp and Best Buy are the bad ones here...
@B-Dubs: where exactly do you think AIG ran to?
are you referring to 0.1% of the 170billion bailout being used for bonuses?
put another way - 1/1000th of the bailout?
People ticked at AIG don't understand math, money, and markets. Sure people were overpaid, but there was no theft or incompetence involved.
@coopjust: because too much of America has been fooled by the media and all the finger pointing. AIG was given bailouts funded by tax payers, etc., which makes the issue 'personal' for so many people. PBCA killed a bunch of people that nobody knew, which somehow makes the issue less 'personal'.
It is just wrong that this is how people see it, but that is the source of emotions that so many are feeling.
Some even blame AIG for the current market conditions - these folks are without rationale and need help.
@AustinTXProgrammer: You would probably laugh then at the 60+ people protesting outside the Dallas AIG offices.... on Saturday.
The folks getting interview were your typical high-school dropout caliber that were pissed that they heard that their tax money was keeping the company afloat.
@simplegreen: What you don't realize is that Wal-Mart is charging 300% on everything. That T-shirt you bought at Wal-mart for $15 was made in China for thirty-five cents.
@Corporate-Shill: unless an item is on sale, i reckon you can't find anything in the confines of "worst buy" that is cheaper than what you can get... well essentially anywhere.
Possibly my own cynicism towards them but i feel like i just rolled around in the dumpster everytime i walk into that place.
on top of that.. if you work at best buy enjoy your layoff's... i hope they go real well for you /officespace
From the 'Convenience Business News"
Wal-Mart Gives Hourly Workers $2 Billion in Bonuses
BENTONVILLE, Ark. - While members of Congress and the Obama administration continue to point fingers at one another over who's to blame for allowing taxpayer-supported AIG to pay out millions of dollars in executive bonuses, Wal-Mart will award $2 billion in extra compensation to approximately 1 million of its hourly workers in the U.S. this year.
During the current recession, Wal-Mart's low price positioning helped it win a greater share of consumers' spending. The discounter is one of the few retailers to report positive sales growth during these down times.
In a memo to employees, recently named CEO Mike Duke wrote: "I believe the key to our success was how associates in every area of our company came together around our shared purpose."
The payouts include bonuses, profit sharing, discounts and 401(k) and stock plan contributions, and represent an increase from the $1.8 billion in bonuses the company distributed to workers last year.
Didn't we already vote on these 2?
@Corporate-Shill: I used to work there in the late 90's. We had a "cost plus 5% discount". I bought a lot of computer and audio cables when I was about to quit because, for example, a USB cable that sold for $24.99 was available to employees for something like 3 bucks. A fair markup for something like that shouldn't be more than 5 or 6 bucks (this was before monoprice.com). A $22 markup is overcharging by at least 300%, right?
best by is far worst than walmart.. come on... all you people out there like getting overcharged 300%?