Wal Mart and Grotesque Immorality

Debbie Shank of Missouri used to work at a Wal Mart. When they offered her to participate in the company health insurance plan, she signed up. Unfortunately she didn’t read the fine print where it said that should she ever receive money in a lawsuit pertaining to any sort of health care, Wal Mart had a recoup whatever it paid out.

Mrs. Shank was in a very bad automobile accident and has been confined to a wheel chair in a nursing home with major brain damage. She has virtually no short term memory. After the accident Mrs. Shank and her husband received $1,000,000.00 and, after fees, were able to put $417,000.00 into a trust that would pay for her long term care in a nursing facility.

Wal Mart sued the Shanks for $470,000.00 that they believed they were entitled to because they had paid, through her health insurance, $470,000.00 in health care expenses. The won the case, but were only able to recoup $417,000.00 because that was all she was able to receive. As a result of this, her fund for long term care are gone, back in the coffers of Wal Mart. Her husband divorced her because her government benefits are greater as a single woman than they are as a married woman. Mr. Shank, however, still supports his now ex-wife and is working two jobs to keep her in care.

Mrs. Shank is unaware of all of this as she cannot remember things from day to day. She lost her 18 year old son in Iraq and asks about him daily. And grieves daily because each day she hears about his death for the very first time.

The Shanks are fighting this in court and ultimately will lose. Wal Mart does have a signed contract from Mrs. Shank and is well within their right to the money. Courts have to decide on the law and the law alone, not on what is good and decent. Goodness and human decency are not laws, but move into the realm of morality.

I have several thoughts on this.

I find the behavior of Wal Mart to be behavior that is grotesquely immoral and indecent. It may be legal, but it’s legality doesn’t make it any better.

Secondly, I find myself angry at what has become, in my perception, to much of corporate America. I once heard a lecture from a business owner in Pennsylvania who said that in the past businesses were supposed to do three things. First was to make or provide a good product. Secondly was to make a profit. Third was to give something back to the community. His fear was the many places were skipping one and three and just worrying about two. Rarely was the third, giving something back to the community, part of the equation.

In fairness to Wal Mart, they often do try to give something back to communities in which they are located. But they obviously do not show great loyalty to those who have worked for them.

Thirdly, I am bone weary of the ‘all about me’ culture we live in. In Genesis Cain asks that immortal question, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” and the rest of the Bible goes on to answer that question in the affirmative. Sadly, even within Christianity we don’t embrace this or even recognize this.

Yesterday I needed something at the store and I was right near Wal Mart. I thought of Debbie Shank and drove on by.