Walmart employs 1.4 million Americans, and pays roughly 800,000 of them less than $25,000/year [PDF]. Because this is barely enough money to live, Walmart workers turn to public assistance, which costs taxpayers $6.2 billion annually [PDF]. These part-time workers—many of whom are black or Latino and female—cannot feed themselves or their families, so employees hold food drives for their colleagues. To call attention to this cruel reality, a labor group chained a giant food bin to the awning of Alice Walton's $25 million Park Avenue condo.

The company earned $16 billion in profit last year, much of it going to the Waltons, America's richest family (Alice is worth $38 billion herself). It is a terrific time to be a giant corporation.

Walmart's workers are planning to strike on Black Friday in 1,600 different locations, demanding full-time, steady employment, and a living wage of $15.

"I’m writing to you because it hurts to see the pain in my younger brothers’ eyes when we can’t afford food to fill their stomachs," La'Randa Jackson, a Walmart employee from Cincinnati wrote in an open letter to Alice Walton.

"Ms. Walton, my co-workers and I don’t want your food bins. We work hard and we don’t want your charity. We want you and your family to improve pay and hours for Walmart workers like me so that we can buy our own groceries. We want fair pay for the work that we do to help your family add $8.6 million a day to your $150 billion in wealth."

A Walmart spokesperson assured Reuters that the company pays "very competitive wages."