If the Public Paid For it, Does That Make Wal-Mart Public Property?

There's Wal-Marts is California? Apparently so -- and we paid about $50 million for them to be built, according to Wal-Mart Subsidy Watch. We're lucky enough to live in a city with lots of locally owned businesses and healthy jobs, but not so in such Steven-Kingishly named towns as Covina, Lake Elsinor, and Redlands.

According to WMSW, California ponied up about $50 in taxpayer-funded gifts to the Arkansas company, in exchange for which those towns got giant megabox shopping extravaganzae. And also, lots of uninsured people -- Wake-Up Wal-Mart estimates that taxpayers spent about $40 million paying for Wal-Mart employees' health care, since the richest company in the universe couldn't be arsed to do so itself. Enjoy those 13-cent discounts, Covina!