Whatever the case, looks like the negativity has gotten to Walmart, so the family can now keep the money. Wal-Mart: Brain-damaged former employee can keep money - CNN.com

Yes, they are responsible - that's why they are her health "insurance" to which she pays a premium. Now, because of a tiny clause, they say they aren't responsible, which legally is true. But it's another case of Wal-Mar and Insurance screwing over a worker/consumer. It's all in the fine print. So, yes, legally, Wal-Mart was in the right. Morally, they are without a doubt, a predatory institution.

It's freakin' shame that $400K + of which this woman will need just to pay for her injuries for the rest of her life is needed so much more by the multi-billionaire giant, Wal-Mart.

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Saw that on Keith Olbermann last night. Exceptional! Imagine what citizen power (of what this country is supposed to be about) can do!

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True ... but does she get to recoup her premiums? It's moot anyway - for academic reasons, I know that legally, Wal-Mart and the Insurance company are in the right. But ethically and morally, shouldn't we advocate for the elimination of such behavior - behavior that effects and can effect each and everyone of us?

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No, this is just an example of people wanting to impose their values solely at the expense of others. There is absolutely nothing immoral or unethical about the terms of the insurance contract. Such terms are commonplace, and help to keep insurance PREMIUMS down for everyone. If you create a precedent for pressuring individuals or companies into relinquishing their legal financial claims, it will merely result in increased costs.

It is not like Walmart was looking to make a profit at this woman's expense, merely seeking to recoup its expenses as per the legal agreement.

Anything else is charity, which I do not believe corporations should be engaged in. It would be better for corporations to keep that money and have it reflected as shareholder equity, or to disburse it to the shareholders as dividends and let the shareholders decide what to do with that money.

I wonder how many of the people who got their panties all in a bunch on their moral outrage soapbox looked into sending this poor mistreated woman money out of their own pockets....

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"It's a good feeling to shoot a bad guy. Something you democrats would never understand. Americans are homesteaders, we want a safe home, keep the money we make, and shoot bad guys!"

----Denny Crane

You don't believe corporations are in it for charity, and neither do I but there are many examples where they receive it in the form of corporate subsidies issued by the taxpayer (welfare). Hey, but as long as the class warfare is directed in one direction, and one direction only, it's okay by you - definitely not by me.

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"Corporate Welfare" comes in two forms:
1. Tax Credits, which I support in the context of my overall belief that we should not have taxes on income or profits, but rather on end-consumption, and anything that moves us incrementally in that direction is a plus in my book.

2. Direct subsidies for specific activities. While I do not dismiss or oppose this practice out of hand, as a practical matter I do find that the overwhelming majority of the time I do not find specific subsidies to be consistent with my notion of the legitimate role of government.

Take "Big Oil", for all the talk of "subsidies" and "welfare", it is not like "Big Oil" is a net recipient of tax dollars, all the "welfare" is nothing more than a reduction in the still huge amounts of money the pay in net terms to the government (which they nor any other business shouldn't be paying in the first place).

Furthermore, much of the "welfare" while decried by the left generically, is driven by left-wing social and economic policy engineering goals. While ethanol subsidies are every bit the "corporate welfare" as royalty relief for "Big Oil", it is hardly motivated by a desire to pour money into corporate coffers, rather it is politicians using their control over other people's money to distort markets into producing the outcome they desire, rather than that of the people as articulated through the outcomes that would otherwise occur absent government distortion and interference in the market.

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"It's a good feeling to shoot a bad guy. Something you democrats would never understand. Americans are homesteaders, we want a safe home, keep the money we make, and shoot bad guys!"

----Denny Crane

Wal-Mart has decided to absorb some of the costs of the trucker's negligence, in effect becoming the trucker's unpaid liability carrier.

Wal-Mart: Brain-damaged former employee can keep money - CNN.com

Matt

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De duobus malis, minus est semper eligendum

bollocks.

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No individual can plan his own existence in their view.

So the state planners must arrogate to themselves the right to manipulate any sector of the economic system if the good of “society” or the “general welfare” is paramount.

Ipso- if the rights of the individual get in the way, the rights of the individual must be sublimated.

The Road to Serfdom
FA Hayek (interpretation)


Mortgage Backed Security survivor

While the result may seem unfavorable, I look at it as affirmation that free market society indeed works. Wal-mart was not required legally to let this woman keep the money, the government did not interfere. However, the consumer, who ultimately should and does have the power in a free market society put ample pressure on the business to have it run they way they saw appropriate. The pressure of loss of business, or demand, allowed the consumer to control the corporation, causing them to restructure their health care package and allow this woman to keep her compensation. Keep the government out of business and let the free market work things out for itself.