Chatting about a research paper with a high school teacher, we drifted a bit and ended talking about the ethics of world size corporations such as Walmart. If Walmart were a country, it would be the 25th largest economy. Read more about it here. Now, this is worth our time to stop and analyze. A corporation grater than 157 other countries?! Let’s remember that by definition a government is supposed to “take care” in some form or another of its people (in theory, that is), while a corporation’s primary or sole purpose is not usually understood to be benefit-giving to the majority of the citizens.

Now, regarding Costa Rica, the entrance of Walmart would have major long lasting effects: starting with the urban immigration, local shops pushed to bankruptcy, and new hundreds of job positions. Jessica Barry writes in her blog about Walmart’s involvement in scandals and its tendency to get away with it. Nevertheless it’s worthwhile to stop one second, and see what’s going on here. Do we feel okay about the tradeoff of pushing to bankruptcy many small businesses for many new jobs?