Many large supermarkets are being built today while the number of small shops is decreasing. Do the advantages of this outweigh the disadvantages?

The increasing number of large supermarkets has called into question their value for locals relative to smaller shops. In my opinion, though supermarkets are more convenient, local people benefit more from supporting their community rather than large conglomerates. The obvious benefits to supermarkets

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to their convenience. They allow consumers to select from a wide variety of products that are consistently available, clearly labelled, fresh, and reasonably priced, depending on the supermarket in question.

This

contrasts with local shops which are necessarily smaller and

therefore

cannot stock as many products. These smaller stores are

also

more likely to run out of goods and charge higher prices. A supermarket can typically operate on smaller profit margins because of the volume of shoppers, which

then

allows them to offer discounts and special deals. All these factors combine to explain the inevitable dominance of large chain supermarkets over local retailers. Regardless, by contributing to small shops, consumers fund those in their immediate community and deprive large companies of outsized profits. The money spent at a supermarket barely trickles down to the local area, through subsistence wages for employees, while the majority of the profits go to distant corporate executives and shareholders. Over time, these large companies have amassed considerable capital, as in the case of a company like Walmart, and now generate disproportionately large sums of money for a handful of individuals while paying minimum wage to most workers and leveraging their distribution power to slash rates with their suppliers. In effect,

this

means that the people producing and selling the food are not reaping the rewards of their efforts. In conclusion, the modern conveniences of supermarkets do not outweigh their pernicious economic impact. Buying from a local shop is one way to better disperse power within a community.