BY HARRY RING
Uncle Sam's Club? - David Glass, top dog at the giant Wal-
Mart retail chain, with operations including Sam's Clubs and
other enterprises, declares: "Our priorities are that we want
to dominate North America first, then South America and then
Asia and then Europe."
`Don't spend it all in one placé - "Though increases in benefit costs remained subdued, wages and salaries spurted 1.2 percent in the three months that ended September 30." - New York Times.
Bourgeois proletarians? - "It's a workers paradise, with no inflation and lots of cheap imports," a banking economist confided to the Times. The paper added: "Workers [?] in financial services, from bankers to mortgage brokers are getting the largest raises."
Be well - A year ago, in New York's Beth Israel medical center, an unwitting patient died when surgeons permitted a salesman to pump eight liters of a saline solution into her uterus, to demonstrate a device he was peddling. "The patient basically drowned," said a state health official. The surgeons, who ignored repeated warnings from nurses, face possible loss of licenses or criminal charges and the salesman could be prosecuted. - Los Angeles Times
Pasta bosses lose their noodles - Hershey's, not satisfied with the bundle it was making on candy, moved in on the pasta market 30 years ago. But lower priced generics and Italian imports are cutting into the bottom line for its brands - Ronxoni, San Giorgio -so they're dumping their pasta operation. Meanwhile Borden's labels - Creamette, Prince - are being hit the same way and may take the same path.
Don't think, believe - "Britain's churches are preparing to launch their annual advertising campaign with the slogan, `Fix the world this Christmas.' But the 35,000 campaign is not going down well with some churchgoers, who say that if Christianity has not managed to fix the world after 2,000 years, it is hardly likely to do so now." - The Times, London.
$$$ R Us - Mattel, the toy kings, will contribute $25 million (over seven years and tax-deductible) to help build the Mattel Children's Hospital in the new UCLA medical center. Mattell has no interest in pushing its products, of course. But, to give the hospital an appealing image, the lobby will feature Hollywood-size versions of Mattel favorites, and each room will get its share of Mattel toys.
Thought for the week - "All bosses are bastards." - Banner of striking miners hanging near the Moscow White House, seat of Russian government.