"In some ways, people forget about average working people, and how they live their lives"
About this Quote
There is a studied humility in Lee Scott's line, the kind that tries to sound like a window while functioning more like a shield. As Walmart's longtime CEO, Scott wasn't describing an abstract sociological blind spot; he was stepping into the rhetorical costume of the overlooked worker while standing atop the most consequential low-wage labor machine in modern retail. The sentence is built to feel gentle and obvious, which is exactly why it lands: no one wants to be the person who "forgets" average working people.
The phrasing does two jobs at once. "In some ways" cushions accountability, suggesting the problem is diffuse, ambient, everyone's fault. "People" is conveniently undefined, dispersing responsibility across media, politicians, coastal elites, maybe even consumers. That vagueness is strategic. It allows Scott to position himself and his company as empathetic observers rather than primary authors of the conditions being discussed: wage ceilings, scheduling instability, reliance on public benefits, the constant squeeze that makes "how they live their lives" a question of survival math.
The subtext is a cultural argument about respect. By invoking "average working people", Scott taps a powerful American identity category that reads as morally virtuous and politically central, even when it's economically marginalized. It's corporate populism: the language of dignity used to pre-empt critique, recast the company as advocate, and frame any backlash as out-of-touch scolding from those who don't understand real life.
In context, it plays like a preemptive reframing of the Walmart story: less about labor practices and market power, more about listening to the people the economy runs on.
The phrasing does two jobs at once. "In some ways" cushions accountability, suggesting the problem is diffuse, ambient, everyone's fault. "People" is conveniently undefined, dispersing responsibility across media, politicians, coastal elites, maybe even consumers. That vagueness is strategic. It allows Scott to position himself and his company as empathetic observers rather than primary authors of the conditions being discussed: wage ceilings, scheduling instability, reliance on public benefits, the constant squeeze that makes "how they live their lives" a question of survival math.
The subtext is a cultural argument about respect. By invoking "average working people", Scott taps a powerful American identity category that reads as morally virtuous and politically central, even when it's economically marginalized. It's corporate populism: the language of dignity used to pre-empt critique, recast the company as advocate, and frame any backlash as out-of-touch scolding from those who don't understand real life.
In context, it plays like a preemptive reframing of the Walmart story: less about labor practices and market power, more about listening to the people the economy runs on.
Quote Details
| Topic | Work |
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