I came across this yesterday on X and I’m still chuckling about it a day later. The setup here is simple. Marxist magazine Jacobin posted an attack on Walmart and its “starvation wages” yesterday. Then they posted the subhead for the article as a tweet. It read:
Infamous for its starvation wages, Walmart just posted staggering first-quarter profits. The surge is a result of its strategic shift toward catering to affluent shoppers while its full-time workers continue to rely on Medicaid and food stamps.
A short time later the tweet received a community note pointing out that Walmart pays its hourly employees a bit more than Jacobin does:
Infamous for its starvation wages, Walmart just posted staggering first-quarter profits. The surge is a result of its strategic shift toward catering to affluent shoppers while its full-time workers continue to rely on Medicaid and food stamps. https://t.co/jScx1YdJ07
— Jacobin (@jacobin) May 20, 2024
In case this ever gets deleted, the community note reads:
Walmart non-corporate Associates’ average hourly wage is $17.50/hour with full-time benefits. Jacobin pays writers $0.07/word, so a Jacobin writer would have to write 250 words an hour continuously to make the same wage as a Walmart Associate, but without benefits.
This is followed by a few links like this one to a page showing what Jacobin pays and this one about Walmart’s benefits plan. The reactions to this note were pretty amusing.
This is the Hiroshima of community notes https://t.co/3CjAybKYdG
— David Burge (@iowahawkblog) May 21, 2024
*meanwhile the Walmart guy is shopping for a new jet ski
— David Burge (@iowahawkblog) May 21, 2024
Of course these are freelance writing jobs but you’d have to push out about seven 1,500 word pieces a week to make as much as a Walmart employee does. It’s possible but even if you did it, you still wouldn’t have the benefits the Walmart employee had.
Also, I’m pretty sure Walmart Associates are treated as employees, meaning the company is paying at least some of the payroll taxes. Freelancers writing for Jacobin are paying all of that themselves. Anyway, lots of people enjoyed seeing the Marxists embarrass themselves.
Wanna see a dead body. https://t.co/Hziawn6epP
— The Redheaded libertarian (@TRHLofficial) May 21, 2024
Even Elon had a laugh over it.
🤣🤣
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 21, 2024
As did many others.
1) We should not be taking advice on starvation from socialists, who historically have produced societies with bread lines & famine.
2) This Community Note has me SCREAMING. Throw me a funeral, I am deceased. https://t.co/wxTvKweKkn
— Billy Binion (@billybinion) May 22, 2024
Jacobin just got guillotined by the community notes https://t.co/OuDDg6bhGr
— Mr Triceratops 🧙🏼♂️🇨🇦 (@TriceratopsMr) May 22, 2024
The most spectacular community note in history 👇 https://t.co/8O2sPLC1M5
— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) May 21, 2024
Holy crap. X Community Notes just toilet papered Jacobin’s house then did donuts in their front lawn. https://t.co/kaFxXmUOoi
— Jason Buttrill (@JasonButtrill) May 21, 2024
So far as I can tell, Jacobin never did respond to the community note. They just pretended it didn’t happen.
Jacobin after that Community Note https://t.co/tZnhIf58xj pic.twitter.com/SxmNnuP35Q
— The Drunk Republican (@DrunkRepub) May 21, 2024
We really are doing okay so long as Marxists are still a laughingstock. May it ever be thus.