On the Fence | A new case against Wal-Mart: Drug monopolies

Ian Saxine Columist

I hate Wal-Mart, and for lots of reasons. Whenever I give them the benefit of the doubt, whether it be with the quality of their products (usually bad) or with the avalanche of lawsuits against them for their heartless and illegal business practices (usually worse), they let me down. This week was no exception. As I sat overcaffeinated and overworked in the library, in between papers, trying to catch up on the news, I came across a news piece that said three women in Massachusetts were suing Wal-Mart for not selling “Plan B,” the brand name morning-after pill. At first, it seemed like bullying by a particularly angry strain of pro-choicer, the kind who forgets the “choice” element of their position. How can it be possible to force a store to sell a certain product? Had these women gone insane?

As far as I could tell, they had, and I wrote a full article suggesting as much, full of arguments about how these women were going too far, were embarrassing the pro-choice movement and themselves, and should just support other businesses who would sell the product in question, as common sense would dictate.

As usual, common sense proved to be terribly misleading. Under normal circumstances, the trio of women suing a company for not selling a certain product they felt it had to offer would be stupidity of the highest order. But this case is special because it involves state law involving pharmacies, and because it involves Wal-Mart.

To begin with, the women were suing because the Wal-Mart in question was in violation of a Massachusetts state law stipulating that all pharmacies within the state be required to stock over-the-counter medicines commonly used by the community, which the board overseeing this law unanimously decided applied to Plan B. Since Wal-Mart now contains pharmacies, this law applies to those stores in Massachusetts, and Wal-Mart is obligated to comply.

Currently, no Wal-Mart stores in the United States carry Plan-B, which is their choice, even if it seems like a foolish one to most people. Pharmacies sell condoms and birth control pills, so why not the morning-after pill? The morning-after pill is, after all, hardly more than an “Oops, my birth control didn’t work” pill. Even so, I would normally oppose laws that force stores to carry a product, except for the fact that pharmacies deal with people’s health, and in many places, Wal-Mart is the only option. In many small towns, Wal-Mart is the only pharmacy. So, I must reluctantly support this necessary attack on the free market.

The fact that Wal-Mart is the victim of this attack provides some consolation, since Wal-Mart has long since stopped being a real part of it. I like capitalism because the free market usually means that better products will be made available thanks to the incentive of competition. Big businesses are not inherently bad, and are sometimes just better at certain things, like selling books. I like Borders, and feel no guilt going there, because it offers a bigger and better selection of the books I like. True, it might not provide certain niche market buyers with what they seek, but that is where smaller businesses come in. If I want to read obscure mystery novels, I can go to a specialty bookseller. If I want an abundance of gay literature, I can shop at places like the bookstore in my hometown of Oak Park, Ill., which is one of the gayest places in America, and thus has a demand for those types of books. And if I want to read a tract entitled “If You Disagree With This Book, You’re a Racist Tool of the Military Industrial Complex,” I can visit Vassar’s Rad Lit library.

But Wal-Mart has, through underhanded, unethical measures, forced out the competition in many places, and so is the only place left. With its official policy of trying to cheat its workforce out of benefits and a full 40-hour work week, the recently revealed sexism running rampant in its pay scale, and its proclivity to stuff its shelves with products made by badly mistreated offshore workers, Wal-Mart is capitalism gone mad. I support the free market because, like the Olympics, it is supposed to reward superiority with success. But Wal-Mart doesn’t play fair and behaves like the Tonya Harding of the free market.

Damn you, Wal-Mart, for making me have to support an attack on the free market to stop your even greater corruption of that market. I have given you the benefit of the doubt for the last time.