Retail

Wal-Mart is like a country within a country. But it’s friendly to the host nation:

“By systematically wresting “pricing power” from the manufacturer and handing it to the consumer, Wal-Mart has begun to generate an economy-wide Wal-Mart Effect. Economists now credit the company’s Everyday Low Prices with contributing to Everyday Low Inflation, meaning that all Americans–even members of Whirl-Mart, a “ritual resistance” group that silently pushes empty carts through superstores–unknowingly benefit from the retailer’s clout. A 2002 McKinsey study, moreover, found that more than one-eighth of U.S. productivity growth between 1995 and 1999 could be explained “by only two syllables: Wal-Mart.” “You add it all up,” says Warren Buffett, “and they have contributed to the financial well-being of the American public more than any institution I can think of.” His own back-of-the-envelope calculation: $10 billion a year.”

The best rumor: “Wal-Mart partners with a Korean auto company to make a private-label car.”