Bloomberg Businessweek: Walmart announced yesterday plans to build dozens of new stores over the next five years in the Chicago area.  The new stores would create approximately 2,000 construction jobs and 10,000 store employee jobs.  Traditionally, Walmart has had difficulty opening stores in urban areas and the initiative in the Chicago area is an attempt to tap the urban market along with its earnings potential.

There has been some resistance to the world’s largest big box chain’s coming to the Windy City.  One group skeptical of Walmart’s motives, Good Jobs Chicago, cites the company’s poor track record on job quality and lack of substantive contributions to the local communities that host the stores.  We all agree that jobs are needed, though, and Walmart also projects that over $500 million in sales and property taxes will be generated by the endeavor.